Loretta, You Leave Kay Ivey Alone You Mean Old Atheist !

Back a couple of years ago State Treasurer Kay Ivey and I had a small skirmish about the Separation of Church and State. My son was attending an event with other high school kids from across the state and Mrs. Ivey was one of the speakers. She touted her faith as important to her and gave it credit in her success in life.

I had no problem with that. Everyone in this country is free to express their religion. Unfortunately, Mrs. Ivey decided to go further than simple expression of her faith and ridicule non-believers referring to them as 'ooze that needed to crawl back under the rock it came from'.

And as you can probably guess that really pissed me off.

I wrote her office and demanded an apology. And I got a half-assed non-apology apology from Mrs. Ivey.

Now, every so often someone will post a comment on the original post and say things like the following...

Stop making such a big deal and being a baby. Those are here beliefs and she was just stating them. She doesn't owe your son anything. If you don't like her don't vote for her next election.. but stop bitching it's not a big deal.

And those comments leave me wondering what planet the person posting it might hail from. It's like they can't understand the difference between someone expressing their beliefs and someone attacking others for their beliefs or lack there of. There is a big difference. As I stated in the opening of this post, if Kay Ivey had stopped at expressing her faith that would have been fine. But when she ridiculed every kid in the audience who didn't share her faith, going so far as to call them 'ooze' she crossed a very serious line. And she admitted guilt because she "apologized".

These same people who post comments like that would go absolutely ape shit if an Atheist in a position of power and presiding over a captive audience of public school students had dared even express their lack of faith much less ridicule others for having a faith. Can you imagine the uproar? Alabamians would have the poor Atheist stoned to death in the public square.

Yet, they will defend with their last breath their right to ridicule others for not sharing their faith. They think they can run over everyone else because there are more of them. I'd like to remind them that might does not equal right and that my freedom to not believe in their imaginary sky wizard is the same freedom they exercise to believe in the sky wizard. Tinkering with or encouraging suppression of my freedom is doing the same thing to their own freedom.

What about that concept do these kinds of "Christians" not get? I mean it's a simple concept right? It's not rocket science.

That wasn't a debate

The ‘debate’ on CNN right now makes me want to vomit…projectile vomit….profusely!! Ron Paul is obviously being skipped over. This isn't a debate it's a McCain/Romney love-fest! What a disgrace!

It would only be interesting if McCain jabbed that damn ‘Sharpie’ into Romney’s eye. Hell, I might even consider voting for John then. If nothing else it would make this farce of a ‘debate’ more exciting. I keep hoping Ron will get up and walk off.

Just for fun I'll remind people that within the last few months I have single-handedly humiliated McCain's Alabama cheerleader Troy King and made Romney's cheerleader State Treasurer Kay Ivey apologize to my son for insensitive remarks she made directed at those who think evolution holds more water than Jesus.

I guess that adds up to me not having many friends in the White House if someone other than Ron Paul gets elected. Oh well....not much different than the previous 33 years of my life.

State Treasurer Apologizes to My Son

Yesterday I posted about my son attending the Leadership in Action Network conference in Montgomery and about some comments Alabama State Treasurer Kay Ivey made in her remarks to the audience. I emailed Mrs. Ivey's office and asked her to apologize to my son.

I clearly apologize to you for any appearance of casting discredit. You are obviously a person with aspiration. I wish you well. Sincerely, Kay Ivey

There was further explanation of her comments in the email but they were nasty and cast doubt on her sincerity.

I know it may seem like I am nit-picking or causing trouble for the fun of it, but I dare say that if an Atheist had addressed the audience and used their disbelief causing others to feel discredited due to their beliefs there would have been far more complaints than this single one.

I am not anti-religion or anti-Christian. I respect everyone's human right to believe or not believe in whatever they choose. It's when church and state collide like this that I protest. Religious belief, or lack thereof, is a private, deeply personal matter. Mixing it with state is the best way to lose that freedom to choose.

Kay Ivey owes my son an apology

My son Alex is a member of the Leadership in Action Network at his school. This weekend he took his second trip to meet leaders in Alabama state government and to hear them speak. One speaker was State Treasurer Kay Ivey.

Now, I do not know Mrs. Ivey, have never had any dealings with Mrs. Ivey and until today had no reason to dislike Mrs. Ivey. That's all changed now.

I asked my son how the trip went and he said it was great until Mrs. Ivey spoke. He said out of the blue and near the end of a very good speech she stated the following, "I am only speaking for myself...but if you are one of those people who believes we evolved out of a pile of goo, that you have no purpose in life...then you should just crawl back to the pile of goo you came from."

Now that isn't verbatim and is second-hand...but it is still intact enough to really piss me off.

We are an Atheist family. My children have always been free to choose religion or leave it alone. Thus far they have chosen to leave it alone. They are creatures of logic and therefore waste no time on things that are obviously illogical to them. However, being Atheist does not mean that we believe we have no purpose in life. Not at all. It simply means that we found our own purpose instead of trying to pull it out of a book written thousands of years ago.

My children have been raised to be respectful of the beliefs of others no matter how fairy-tale death-cultish they are. Why can't state leaders show the same respect to the rest of us? Why do they always have to insert their irrelevant religious beliefs into every thing they do? Do they really think that every smart kid in Alabama is a Christian who ignores science?

I'd like Kay Ivey to apologize to my son. She had absolutely no right to throw in that statement about her personal beliefs at a state function and she made my son feel very uncomfortable and out of place. Who gives a rat's ass what she thinks of people who don't think and believe the same things that she does?

I've just sent her the following email. We'll see what happens.

Mrs. Ivey,

My son Alex attended the LAN conference at the Embassy Suites in Montgomery on Jan. 28, 2008 and he heard you speak there. He mentioned that your remarks about evolution ("If you believe you came from a pile of goo....") made him feel very uncomfortable. You see, we are an Atheist family and we feel evolution has more credibility than creationism. We also are firm in our convictions that our purpose in life is as meaningful as yours and everyone else's. As an elected official you should be more respectful of the views of others. We elected you to keep track of our money....not proselytize to our youth at a function that has absolutely nothing to do with your religious beliefs.

I believe you owe my son an apology. You can call him at 251-650-2271 or email him at *****************

Regards,
Loretta Nall