Mallory+MPW’s+OpEd+Article



I hate that I can never be president, or win an elected political office just because I would refuse to say “god bless America” after my speech. My qualifications for the position would be thrown to the roadside after all of the religious people of America found out that I don’t believe in god. I’d be rich (or at least solid middle class) if I got a dollar for every time someone told me I have no moral values or I worship Satan. Just because I don’t believe in god doesn’t mean I am incapable of human feeling.

I used to be friends with this girl who drank a lot, and had sex more times than she could count, and one day after explaining to me in full length one of her sex stories, she turned to me and said “I am so jealous of you. When you start having sex and drinking, you won’t feel bad about it because you don’t believe in god.” Until then, I had never equated believing in god to having moral values or heard anyone who did. But from then on, I noticed it more and more. At HOBY last June, our assignment was to write words that we associate with stereotypes or just general terms, such as rich, poor, lesbian, and gay, on these giant pieces of white paper around the room. I went on my merry way until I got to atheist and saw what people wrote. Words such as careless, heartless, soulless, wicked, and evil were written in abundance all over the paper. There was not one positive word written on it. I was crushed that out of 350 high school students, not one could think of a positive word for atheist. We were told to rip off an associated word from one of the stereotypes that meant something to us and keep it with us to remember not to judge. I ripped off careless, because to me, that hurt. The fact that just because I don’t believe in god, means I don’t care about anyone and am incapable of being a good person offended me.

Not to point any fingers, but Catholic Priests are not the most “caring” people I have ever heard of. There were over 10,500 reported sexual abuse cases between 1950 and 2002 involving a priest and a boy younger than 18. I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound very moral to me. That statistic is not including the 1,732 cases that the Roman Catholic Church spent $1,197 million on hiding. If people who believe in god are held up to such a higher standard, then why are their sexual abuse rates the same as the United States sexual abuse rates? That sounds a bit hypocritical to me.

My biggest pet peeve, other than warm milk, is that there is a gratuitous “under god” in the pledge of allegiance. Yes, to people rolling their eyes at me, I do realize I can just not say it and solve the problem, but as many people know, I am not like that. “Under god” was not in the original Francis Bellamy 1892 Pledge of Allegiance. It was added by Congress in 1954, following a campaign by the Knights of Columbus to add it. In my opinion, the “Under god” wrongly confuses allegiances to your country and allegiances to your god. And not to mention, it does not stay consistent with the separation of church and state and the Establishment Clause in the United States Constitution.

I see the way people look at me differently when they find out I don’t believe in god. And I hate that. I promise I am still a nice person, regardless of my “careless” religious views. I have had no problem formulating moral values despite the lack of church and bibles in my life. I believe I am a strong, moral, caring person thanks to my parents and the positive influences I have had in my life. I am no better and no worse than any god-fearing human.

I hope by the time I run for president, our country is progressive enough to accept a secular president. But with the media making sure Obama goes to church every Sunday and expecting him to say “god bless America” after every speech, I’m not too optimistic. The fact that the media went crazy when Obama mistakenly said “Jedi mind meld”, gives me no hope that they would ever accept any other president, than a Christian one. But a girl can dream. And dream I will.