What Even Is Mental Health?

Jon and Ron talk about the history of mental health, mental illness, and religion’s role in stopping progress…like always.

Jon and Ron have a little chat about our experiences with mental health, self care, and how to deal with the world crumbling around you.
https://www.recoveringfromreligion.org/mental-health-resources/

Gandalf Or God?! Ron has to guess whether four quotes come from The Lord Of The Rings or The Bible. We’re keeping a running total to see if he can keep his score in positive numbers.

What Even Happened? Jon and Ron talk about their week and what they watched, read, or did that made it not so terrible.
Heifer International: http://www.heifer.org
Realm Defense: https://www.babeltimeus.com
Level Up Life: https://lvluplife.com
Zombies, Run! https://zombiesrungame.com
Coheed and Cambria: http://www.coheedandcambria.com

Intro music by Austin Colón:
http://austincolon.wixsite.com/music
https://austincolonmusic.bandcamp.com/album/the-path-ahead

We have a Patreon page!
http://www.patreon.com/wayward/
http://www.facebook.com/thewaywardwillis
Twitter: @waywardwillis

We’re part of the Famous Original Podcast Network! Check out our sibling shows at http://www.fopnet.biz

What Even Is Blood Doctrine?

Jon and Logan talk about the Jehovah’s Witness blood doctrine and the controversies surrounding blood transfusions and eating gazelle meat!

Jon talks to Becca about her ex-JW understanding of the blood doctrine and her personal experience with the effects.
http://www.sarahtalk.com
https://www.facebook.com/SarahTalkRadio/
Twitter: @SarahTalkRadio

Logan talks about carbon nanotubes and their flexible applications, while Jon tries to fit a phone up his butt.

Intro music by Austin Colón:
http://austincolon.wixsite.com/music
https://austincolonmusic.bandcamp.com/album/the-path-ahead

We have a Patreon page!
http://www.patreon.com/wayward/
http://www.facebook.com/thewaywardwillis
Twitter: @waywardwillis
http://waywardwillis.com

What Even Is Scientology?

Show Notes

Jon and Logan talk about Scientology and L. Ron Hubbard’s shady life.

Jon talks to YouTuber/author Chris Shelton about his ex-Scientologist and critical thinking projects!
https://mncriticalthinking.com
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCF326xyA0QHI7Z5xAwKQDJg
http://patreon.com/chrisshelton
http://facebook.com/chris.shelton.3914
Twitter: @sheltondesigner

Jon goes off on some rant about stupid men and their stupid behavior.

Jon and Logan break down a verse from the Bible and discuss detachable penises.

Intro music by Austin Colón: http://austincolon.wixsite.com/music
We have a Patreon page!
http://www.patreon.com/wayward/
http://www.facebook.com/thewaywardwillis
Twitter: @waywardwillis
https://willisweb.com

Hanging Out The Walsh: Manning Like a Man

Manly Man

I don’t know who Matt Walsh is.  I only know he has bad ideas.  This “Hanging Out The Walsh” series will be an ongoing critique of his blog posts and podcast in an effort to highlight misinformation, blatant lies, and misapplication of religious ideas to the real world.

At random, I’m starting this series on a post titled “Dads, We Can’t Expect Our Sons to Become Real Men If We Don’t Teach Them How.”  What strikes me first is the black-and-white view of gender roles Walsh imposes on his world.  The theme of this post is that boys need to be taught to be “real men” (just as girls need to be taught to be “real women”) and that an inevitable break-down of society is occurring because men are (as a whole?) becoming more feminine.  There are plenty of issues with this idea.

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Spare the Rod, Part 2

Louis CK on Child Abuse

MSN posted an article today referencing France’s new law banning violence against children, including corporal punishment (or “spanking”).  While Conservatives would argue this is yet another sign of the downfall of society, I’m encouraged that we’re now discussing on a broader scale the efficacy of hitting children.  I previously wrote a piece titled “Spare the Rod” in which I discussed my personal experience with corporal punishment and the fact that it never really deterred me, but I want to point out a few items from the article with which I heartily agree:

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Facebook Affirmations, Vol. VII: Transgender

Oh really? Tell me more.
In my news feed on Facebook I will be served a daily dose of Christian affirmations from friends.  In this series of posts, which I call “Facebook Affirmations™,” I will post and discuss some of these gems.
Today’s Facebook post doesn’t come from my own feed, but it inspired such grotesque feelings that I wrote a response that likely wouldn’t ever have seen the light of day and I want to share it here.  The Facebook post in question had these points to make (paraphrased and summarized by me):
  1. The military has changed its stance on transgender service members to where, like homosexual service members, they can openly serve without fear of being persecuted or kicked out of the military
  2. Transgender service members will have access to healthcare needs via the normal service members’ healthcare system, which may include gender reassignment and/or hormones
  3. This country doesn’t do enough for veterans (MY NOTE: I have no idea what this had to do with anything because it’s completely unrelated to transgender service members unless the context is the support of transgender veterans…but it wasn’t)
  4. Transgender people and their medical needs are just gross
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Family Ties

One thing religious people cannot stress enough is that they’re all about family.  Their organizations even have names like Focus on the Family and the American Family Association (branded a hate group out of MS).  For the most part I find this to be true so long as everyone’s keeping the faith and maintaining the status quo.  I can say from my upbringing (aside from corporal punishment and having no say in church attendance) that our Christian family was very tight-knit and we spent a lot of quality time together.  It wasn’t perfect, but it was far better than a lot of other families I’ve seen.  Now, to clarify, some of these not-so-happy families I’ve seen are religious as well so it’s not as though they have a corner on the market.  I’m just speaking to the Christian view that family is important.

As I said, religious families are close-knit and happy so long as everyone’s keeping the faith.  They don’t say, “The family that prays together stays together” for no reason.  It’s literally true.  I found this out myself when I started to upset the status quo of my family and I was made to feel like an outcast.  My family’s treatment of me was mild compared to what some people endure at the hands of their religious parents, grandparents, and siblings.

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Lowering the Bar

Whenhen I was a Christian it seemed like everything I saw pointed to the truth of god’s existence.  I had the Bible, my parents’ word, my Sunday School teachers and preachers, any number of books and pamphlets, and nature itself bolstering my faith.  I felt like I had good reason to believe what I did and I didn’t even have to look for evidence: everything was evidence!

That is, until I actually started examining my beliefs and my reasons for holding them.  What I found was not that the evidence for god was strong, but that I was willing to accept pretty much anything as evidence so long as it adhered to my preconceptions.  Those things that didn’t conform to my beliefs were simply ignored without any thought at all.

Christian evidence
Christian? Evidence? Hmmm.
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Respect for Respect’s Sake

I’ve been in a number of debates in person and online where emotions flared and the conversation eventually boiled down to a variant of the following:

Why can’t you just respect a person’s beliefs?

Here’s the problem with that: not all beliefs are created equal and not all are worthy of respect.  The person saying the above is usually emotionally invested in the beliefs I’ve questioned and is usually unable to present any rational reason for a person holding those beliefs in the first place.  What they’re really saying is, “Since I can’t defend my untenable beliefs I really wish you would leave them alone so I don’t feel like I have to!”

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