Gary Barten has taken a perfectly good political topic and added religion to the mix. Barten shouldn’t complain about Senyszyn’s participation in the American Atheists.

Senyszyn’s letter was about the Cuban protesters in Miami. First off, Barten accuses me of saying that because the atheists are a minority, they must be correct.

However, my original point was this: Atheist protesters are such a small group that they cannot cause the situation that the Cuban protesters did in Florida. Unfortunately, no one pays much attention to the atheist protesters.

The social ill the Promise Keepers pose is manifold. Unquestioned obedience to their leaders, borderline misogyny in regards to “running” a household and confusing the Christian religion with a guerrilla war to take America among others.

Now Barten starts confusing truth with good and evil in an attempt to indict atheist morality.

I can only answer from my own personal morality because each atheist probably has a different set of opinions about morality.

There is no ultimate good or evil. In fact, the notions of “good” and “evil” have nothing to do with facts and are instead opinions. The authority I determine evil from is myself, although I try not to think in such infantile terms.

In the end, atheists are just as moral as Christians. I’m willing to bet that about 90 percent of prisoners in the United States are Christian. About 90 percent of the population of the United States is Christian.

As an aside, Barten complains about praying and the Ten Commandments in school. There is no law on the books, and likewise no one wants to abridge your child’s right to pray before a math test or whenever. I want you to stop surreptitiously intimidating other children with your public displays of religion.

Regarding the commandments, fully half of them are religious in nature; only five of the Ten Commandments deal with morality! Forcing children to pray and posting your religious views in school is exactly what the First Amendment bans. Now, back to the Miami-Dade issue.

Bush is hypocritical independent of the protesters; Bush wasn’t protesting. Bush is hypocritical because he keeps changing his tune to whatever gains him the most ground. First, he trusted the people, not the government.

Now, he trusts the ballot machine, not the people. Next, Barten compares the rioting Cubans with Rosa Parks.

If I yell “fire” in a crowded theater, does that make me a civil rights hero to you? Barten ends his letter with a general critique of the liberal media. I didn’t hear a peep about the “liberal media” when it was gleefully running Clinton through the mud with the help of the Republican elite.

Notice how the vote complaint is so un-noteworthy that complainers such as Barten have to keep changing the subject?

Keith Twombley

Sophomore

Computer science and philosophy