America Now

-by, Marquell Garrett
-DATE: October 13, 2007


What does the word America means? I will tell you what America use to be. America use to be a place free from religious persecution and a place of equality and opportunity where everyone was welcomed. Is that America now? America use to be a place where the individuals had majority of the power, followed by the States, then lastly the federal government. The government, both State and federal had a system of checks and balances and the people always held a close eye on the government to prevent the government from acting in matters that are not at best interests of the people. America now has given the government too much authority and has traded in the dream of freedom for the nightmare of chaos. I ask, how long are we going to pretend that things are under control and that things are so great? I ask, how long are we going to ignore the basic bill of rights, civil rights, and equal rights of the atheists and homosexuals in this nation? I ask, how long are we going to pretend that this place we call America is still the dream and life of freedom? In New York City there lies a view of a great and powerful symbol that we call the Statue of Liberty. Is this a statue of liberty, or is it a statue of slavery to the cancer of racism, prejudice, and inequality that we allow to eat at our society today. I’m afraid America has allowed the torch of freedom to burn out and now we are left only with the ashes and memories of the great nation we once were.
Today, America has chosen to allow its prejudice and fear of indifference to overcome the beauty of America. Today, America teaches the future of America, the American children, that it is ill moral and wrong to be a homosexual and ok to deny homosexuals the same civil and equal rights as everyone else. This is a very dangerous thing to do. We are instilling hatred and prejudice into the hearts of our children and so by default we are insuring the destruction of this nation we call America. America is no longer the land of the free because America is no longer free. America has become convinced that homosexuality is ill moral and that same sex marriages are unethical and should not be allowed under any circumstances within the United States of America. Remaining of our once great nation, lie a nation full of all of the hopes and dreams America use to portray. Canada allows same sex marriages and believes that what a person wishes to commit to is his’ or hers’ right. Why is it that Canada understands how things should be yet the United States of America, “the leader of the free world” is blinded by religious convictions and believe that same sex marriages are ill moral? What ever happened to Separation of Church and State? What ever happened to an individual’s rights far out weighing the rights of the government? Why is it that for the first time in the history of the U.S., the United States is proposing to limit individual’s rights? The bigger question though is why aren’t everyone as out raged on the subject as I. The fact is that society today is not the same society during the times of our founding fathers. Society no longer is concern about individual privacy and bill of rights; they would rather have an illusion of security. Society no longer cares about being free and equal; they would rather force what they believe to be right at the time, onto all Americans through the laws of the land. This is outrageous. A person surely has the right to disagree with laws and ways of living due to their own personal or religious beliefs. A person do not have the right to tell others by the law that they cannot live a certain way, although that certain way harms no one else in retrospect. America has every right to disagree with homosexual lifestyles. America has no right to ban same sex marriages, and ban same sex couples from adopting a child. To ban same sex marriages is to say it is ok to marry a member of the opposite sex because it places no harm on others and is popular, but then say it is not ok to marry a member of the same sex because it is not as popular as opposite sex marriages and it is different. This is unacceptable and as ignorant as it was to say that blacks can’t marry whites because it is different and ill moral. However, America is so blinded by their hate and prejudice that they fail to realize the danger in their attitude and gestures toward American homosexuals. It is outrages to allow single parents the right to adopt a child then deny and couple the right to adopt a child based on their sexual preference. What I am getting at here is that statistics shows that couples tend to raise children better than single parents. Statistics also shows that same sex couples tend to raise a child just as well or better than any other couple. So with this being said, what grounds do you have for the same sex couples not adopting? Many States have now passed laws allowing same sex couples to adopt but there are still a few States that will not allow such actions. Such States, in my opinion, should be brought in front of the courts and sued for denying the fair and equal protection under the law to so many great American couples. Many people discover that their life long pal is gay and all of a sudden no longer wishes to be affiliated with him or her. This is a very ignorant thing to do. They are still the same people as you knew before hand. Being a homosexual does not change the person at all. Parents are going around teaching their kids that being a homosexual is wrong and ill moral. Parents are essentially going around teaching their kids to hate homosexuals and harming the future of America and the world. America should not be teaching their kids to hate what is different. America should not be teaching their kids that things that are hard to understand, and things that are different are ill moral. Yet here we are today, living in an America that teaches our children hate and we treat the different with lack of respect and ill morally. At some point you have to ask yourself, who are the monsters? Who lives in the evil part of society and who teaches ill morals and bad ethics? Is it the homosexuals, or is it the American society? Many people try to say that homosexuality is ill moral because the bible and the church are against such lifestyles. I tell you today that religion is not suppose to have any jurisdiction in the American government. This government was created by the people, for the people; this government was not created by God for God. This brings me to my next point. Since when is it ok to represent a free nation, that was created for the people by the people, with a religions gesture or a religious symbol.
Atheists are constantly misrepresented in this nation and constantly denied fair and equal protection under the law. The pledge to the flag of this nation represents the religious community in this nation but fails to represent the nonreligious community, thus, the pledge to the flag fails to represent America. In God We Trust is imprinted on every dollar Americans spend daily. What is this suppose to say about America? I tell you America, the imprint In God We Trust says a lot more about America than America think it does. In God We Trust says America is not concerned with the rights of the non believer. It says that we as a nation are no longer concerned about representing all Americans. It says that this nation has become polluted and over ran with religion, which is what our founding fathers were trying to prevent over 200 years ago. Why is it that America is still struggling with the issue of separation from church and state? It is the responsibility of this nation to keep the religious world out of the world of government and order. We as a nation pretend that it is ok to have the religious majority running this government but in all actuality this nation has been at its best, on the terms of freedom and equality, when this nation was governed by the people. Let’s no make any mistake about this, the religious majority only is concerned with correcting things according to their religion and not looking at what the individual people want. It is time to take back this government and for this government to once again understand what it means to fear the people. Malcolm-X once said, “We’ve never experienced the American dream, we have only experienced the American nightmare”. I’m afraid today that nightmare has grown more terrifying than ever and is now apart of reality. Atheists are the largest group of people to be ignored world wide. In 2002 there were over 800 million nonbelievers world wide that were openly nonbelievers. Because of the negative stigma and prejudice that comes along with being an atheist, many nonbelievers choose to remain secret. That means that there was most likely over one billion nonbelievers world wide in 2002 and all censuses and statistics indicates that there are over 2 billion nonbelievers world wide today. Majority of the prison population world wide are majority filled with theists, in fact, less than one percent of the prison population world wide are atheists. Out of all group of people, atheists have the lowest divorce rate and lowest suicide rate. Atheists are not bad people. We will not be denied our basic civil liberties and we will not be ignored. The United States is the worst nation to deny atheists their basic civil rights. It is very hypercritical to say that a phrase involving the word “God” must be removed from a State Court House but then say it is ok for the words “Under God” to remain in our pledge to the American Flag, and ok for the words, “In God We Trust” to remain on our currency. That is what America is doing now. The rest of the world have their prejudice and discrimination against nonbelievers that must be stopped and crushed right away, but the United Stated is the worst and should be held to higher standers. For it is the United States that is supposed to be the land of the free and the home of the brave. America has the highest population of atheists who are in prison. Perhaps this says more about America, than it does about atheists. It’s time for America to save itself and rid this nation of all the prejudice and hateful feelings toward nonbelievers and stop denying atheists their basic civil rights.
Pat Robinson said the Christians have enough votes to take over this nation and that when the people have had enough, they will take over. I am telling that Pat Robinson today that the people have had enough. The atheists in this nation will not stand for such discrimination and will not stand around while the Christians force their religious ways onto the nonbelievers. In conclusion, I did not break free from the chains of religion only to be chained again by religious fanatics. Atheists are not going to be pushed around anymore so you have better come ready for a fight America, because the nonbelievers will not give up their civil rights for religious ways and convictions. The phrase” Under God” is coming from this nation’s pledge to the flag. The phrase “In God We Trust” is coming off of the U.S. Currency. The words, “God save the Supreme Court”, will not be recited as the opening of court cases in the U.S. Supreme Court. All religious gestures and phrases will be removed from every court house in this nation. I am telling you today America, the war for equality has just began, and the atheists in this nation are ready to fight for their freedom so I hope you are ready to fight to deny us that freedom, or prepared to surrender us our freedom and equality. With this being said, this war for equality will not just end or begin with the atheists’ rights. There will be a constitutional amendment that will clarify the basic civil rights and liberties of homosexuals in this nation including their right to adopt and their right to marry. It is unacceptable to deny any American their basic civil liberties. Atheists and homosexuals have been denied their civil rights for far too long, the war has now begun, and this is a war that will be a victory for America because America will return to the old dreams and values of freedom and equality. Atheists, homosexuals, and all Americans will be treated with respect and equality with equal protection under the law. My message to all of the religious community who wishes to push their faith onto all Americans, the war for equality has began once again and the homosexuals and atheists are ready to fight for their civil liberties and so I hope you are ready to fight to deny the homosexuals and the nonbelievers their civil liberties or prepared to surrender them their civil liberties.