Religion is Insane
There's a wire story that I read on Salon that really disturbed me today. Basically, a Texas woman stoned her kids to death because she thought she was getting signs from God. She's entered a plea of innocent because of insanity. I do not disagree that this woman is a total headcase whack-job, but she needs to be locked up for a very long time for doing this. I can understand mental illness as a defense in certain cases, but this story is really amazingly disturbing for me. Her defense attorney has a lot of guts trying this. I wonder if the jury will give her the death penalty.
Isn't it amazing the things people will do in the name of their religion or beliefs? It's not just Islam either. And if they just decide she was insane and put her in a treatment facility, does that mean that anyone that commits a crime in the name of their religion can also easily claim insanity because they were hallucinating instructions from God? I mean, if you hallucinate sparkly flying elves that tell you to kill someone, and you don't have pre-conceived notions about sparkly flying elves then I'd definitely say you are insane and probably should be treated instead of jailed. But if you already have a firm belief in God, and then suddenly you think you've received a message from God to do something you're not really hallucinating are you? You already believe that God is real, and is affecting people's lives, and you should do what you're told and follow the signs. The insanity argument doesn't really hold, does it?
Or maybe she really is just clinically insane. Go read the story.