Oh...God.

Back in 2011 I went to an all day seminar called Get Motivated! There were a lot of different speakers and it had been heavily advertised and it was cheap, like a few dollars a ticket cheap, AND...here is my big confession, I love shit like that. Keynote speakers at conferences? Love them. I heard some great speeches in my time in corporate America. And I am a sucker for them. Because they are stories, someone is up there telling you a story about their life, and I dig it. 

So I went. I went with a friend who also loves stuff like that. We sat together at a lot of Keynote presentations over the years and were usually the only two out of our group of ten who were like, "THAT WAS GREAT!"

The day was interesting. Not quite what I went in expecting but once I was in the middle of it, I realized that of course this is what it would be. There was no way those super cheap tickets were going to pay the speaking fees for even one of the presenters let alone the 8 or 9 we heard. So, of course, there were sales. Oh wait, excuse me, opportunities! I mean we were all there to get motivated right? So what better motivation than learning about trading stocks? Or real estate stuff or whatever the other sales pitches were that I've forgotten now. 

There was also a lot of god talk. Which, again, the majority of the speakers, if not all of them, were conservatives (I saw General Powell, Laura Bush and Rudy Giuliani in my mix of speakers just for examples) and so there was a lot of blessed by and his hand guiding and god bless America, that sort of thing that you get used to hearing if you live in the USA and listen to politicians talk. But there was even more, including at one point an honest to goodness come to Jesus moment with an altar call. Like we were at a revival not a motivational conference. 

So at the end of the day I posted about it, calling it mix of motivational speakers, sales pitches and god talk. The friend I went with was really insulted that I described it that way. He got a little huffy about it and did the "we just took different things from the experience" thing. Which was weird to me. Because he bought one of the programs that they were selling so he knew I was right about the sales pitches, and as I said at one point there was a literal altar call to go along with all the other god talk. But for him that all just washed over him without him really noticing. 

And he thought I was making it up. That maybe one of them had said something about god, but not most. Surely not. 

And that's what it's like to be an atheistically leaning agnostic in America. The god talk is so pervasive that everyone around you hears it without hearing it. God bless the United States of America. Oh god has blessed me so much that this happened. I just thank god that my cancer is gone. On and on and on. If you are out in public at all you can't really avoid it. But because you can't avoid it you mostly don't notice it either. I mean, as long as you aren't a different religion or no religion at all, then it's really noticeable.

And it's weird because when you point it out people get pissy. 

And just for the record, when I looked up the seminar to see if they were still doing them and just avoiding Portland because we are on the conservative EEK! list, nope. They went out of business in 2012 when the evangelical couple who founded it got divorced and sued by a woman who lost everything she had and then some from "investing" in one of the programs sold to her at a seminar. So yeah, a mix of motivational speakers, god talk and sales.

But Laura Bush was surprisingly engaging. 

And Bill Cosby was such a horrible asshole that I was not one of the people shocked to find out he is a horrible asshole. 

And I didn't buy anything. 
And I didn't convert.

And I was right about what it was.

So yeah, overall it was a good day. 

But the reminder of it hit with a lot of other god talk items around me lately so it's churning in my head. Expect another blog, but of a more ranty nature soon. I just figured I'd share this story as a warmup.