Christians vs Atheists in California Nativity Debacle

[LunarSage]

Article

Basically what happened is that there are 21 lots in a public area in California that have for years and years always been used for Christmas nativity displays by various Christian church groups.  Last year, the city ran a lottery to see who could rent the lots during the holiday season.  18 out of the 21 lots were won by atheist groups, who then put up signs essentially decrying religion as foolishness.  Some of the atheist signs were torn down or otherwise vandalized, presumably by people who consider themselves Christians. 

Now I for one am not an atheist, but I believe wholeheartedly in the value of free speech in America.  Vandalizing the signs was just bad form in my opinion.

[Tsenta]

Putting the signs up in the first place was also bad tact, if someone celebrates a holiday due to their religion who are they to judge if it's foolish or not?  Kind of see it as an even playing field right now.

[Oniya]

A better response would have been for the religious groups (I'm not even going to limit it to Christians) to pool their efforts into making a really amazingly eye-catching display.  Given the choice, more people look at bright pretty lights than pieces of paneling with words on them.

[ulthakptah]

This is another oh so popular case of the jerks with the loudest mouths speaking on behave of everyone else. Atheist aren't bad people; they are people who do not believe in deities. However there are some atheists whose reasons for being atheist is that they hate all the other religions. Ironically their hatred of religion is because of the jerks with the loudest mouths in religion hating things.

Really I don't understand why atheists would have a problem with the nativity in a public place. So what if it is a symbol of a believe that isn't they're own? I don't get upset about seeing menorahs and Stars of David. It's not like the nativity is offensive. Putting up signs saying mean things about groups of people is offensive. Really I don't think this is an issue of free speech, but one of the freedom of religion. The purpose of the signs was not for atheist's right to free speech, but to push out and prohibit the free exercise of a belief that was not their own, and that's what they did. They cause so much trouble trying to be as offensive as possible to a group of people that the city had rather nobody use the space then put up with all the bickering. A sad day for humanity once again proving that people just can't get along if they don't think exactly the same as everyone else.

[Callie Del Noire]

Didn't all the 'take the 10 commandments out of the courthouses' crap a decade or so back start because some atheist with too much time on his hands and the willngness to go all over the south to sue to have them removed from public property?

Ironically a lot of them were put in as part of a promotion of the '10 Commandments' with Charlton Heston.

[Oreo]

To be frank, I am confused by it all. Spreading hate during a time of year when even wars have been suspended for the day seems an act against humanity. Shall we remove Saint Nicholas Santa too? He is after all a religious icon. Or take down all the Christmas trees for environmentalists? Or even change the name to Holiday trees? *sigh* This little cookie is hurt by hate in any form.

[ulthakptah]

Yep, and afterwards the next logical step would be to start taking down Saint Valentine's, and Saint Patrick's day.

[Oniya]

Two quotes that I've been spreading around Facebook this year (found them last year) :

If someone sincerely wishes you a "Happy" anything and this brings you anger, the anger is coming from inside of you... and I believe this is the bigger problem.

Saying "Happy Holidays" to strangers does not take the Christ out of Christmas, but your claiming to speak for Him while you shop might tick Him off.

[Caitlin]

Is it so weird to think that having christians tell that god exists offends atheists just as much as it offends christians to hear from atheists that god doesn't exist?

Or what if another religion is introduced in the mix and claims that only his religion is the right one?

I don't think atheists have something against the underlying principles of Christmas and enjoy the season just as much as anybody else does, but at the same time I can understand that they feel offended by people claiming that a god exists.


Long story short; we'd all get along a lot better if we were more tolerant towards one another, and didn't put so much effort in trying to convince others of our own opinion and beliefs. :-)

[ulthakptah]

I'm not offended that atheists don't believe in any theology. I'm offended when certain atheists claim that believing in any theology makes a person less intelligent than those who don't.

[Deamonbane]

I'm not offended that atheists don't believe in any theology. I'm offended when certain atheists claim that believing in any theology makes a person less intelligent than those who don't.

Agreed... however, we Christians(And people of other Religious beliefs) should also respect the beliefs of Atheists, as they have reasons for believing so... of course, should they begin to be offensive about it, I see no problem with fighting back... vandalism is never the answer, though...

[Caitlin]

I'm not offended that atheists don't believe in any theology. I'm offended when certain atheists claim that believing in any theology makes a person less intelligent than those who don't.

Strangely enough, this is exactly what christians claimed of natives who they felt needed to be converted to the christian faith, because they believed in non-existing gods and thought of them as stupid and not enlightened. The past decades a new movement seems to have arisen that now does the same with christianity. In my country atheism is the fastest growing 'religion'. More and more people no longer feel affiliated to a specific religion and though a lot of people still believe in a form of god or afterlife, and increasing number also beliefs in neither of them.

Give it another 50 years and I'm betting that the atheists outnumber the religious people by far in my country.

[vtboy]

Didn't all the 'take the 10 commandments out of the courthouses' crap a decade or so back start because some atheist with too much time on his hands and the willngness to go all over the south to sue to have them removed from public property?

Ironically a lot of them were put in as part of a promotion of the '10 Commandments' with Charlton Heston.

Put yourself in the shoes of a woman suing to enjoin the state from invading her vagina with an ultrasonic probe so she can be forced to observe her fetus's heartbeat on a monitor before having an abortion. Don't you think she might find a display of the ten commandments over the courthouse doors a bit offputting?

I don't think this was a case of someone with too much time on his hands, at all. The suggestion inherent in such displays is that judges will be guided in their decisions by religious teachings. In a society that purports to be governed by secular principles, and claims to permit freedom of conscience for all, everyone should be appalled by the implicit message.   

[Deamonbane]

As I recall, the Ten Commandments in the themselves have nothing against abortion(I could be wrong, of course, as I haven't read them in a while), and cover every basic of secular law... so having them above the Courthouse really shouldn't be that much of a problem...

[ulthakptah]

Strangely enough, this is exactly what christians claimed of natives who they felt needed to be converted to the christian faith, because they believed in non-existing gods and thought of them as stupid and not enlightened. The past decades a new movement seems to have arisen that now does the same with christianity.

And so the cycle continues... You would think by now someone would have looked at history to see how persecuting a person solely on their believes ends.

As I recall, the Ten Commandments in the themselves have nothing against abortion(I could be wrong, of course, as I haven't read them in a while), and cover every basic of secular law... so having them above the Courthouse really shouldn't be that much of a problem...

Indeed, personally I find that people assuming that all Christians are against abortion is aggravating as it is not true.

[Silk]

As I recall, the Ten Commandments in the themselves have nothing against abortion(I could be wrong, of course, as I haven't read them in a while), and cover every basic of secular law... so having them above the Courthouse really shouldn't be that much of a problem...

1.

Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

Thats already off putting to anyone of not the Christian faith (non secular)

2.

You shall not make for yourself a carved image

Argueable value and largely irrelevant (non secular)

3.

You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain

Happens whenever someone has to take an oath with under god in it when they don't believe, (non secular)

4.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

People work on Sunday's get over it (non secular)

5.

Honor your father and your mother,

Shame child abuse cases happen and child vs parent court cases do happen (Semi-secular, theres no law on it)

6.

You shall not murder.

At number 6 we at last have a secular law (secular)

7.

You shall not commit adultery.

Although morally wrong in society I'm pretty sure there is very little the law has to say on it. (semi secular)

8.

You shall not steal.

The other secular law in the 10 commandments (secular)

9.

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Remember children, god doesn't want you to tell porkies to your neighbour, few curcumstance it's relevant, court is one of them (Secular)

10.

You shall not covet

Pretty sure Jealously isn't a secular law, (non secular)




So there you have it, 2(3) of the ten commandments have been made into secular law, 2 of them are semi relevant to secular law, and 5 are religious only. Also they do not cover the basic law's because torture and rape is not under the list, and I'm pretty sure the geneva convention and bill of human rights was pretty big on the torture thing.

[ulthakptah]

Did courts have to get rid of Lady Justice too? After all she is the Roman/Greek goddess of Justice.

[Caitlin]

I doubt it, she stands for believing in fair trials. Even atheists will be hard-pressed to be against that. ;)

It also helps that you don't have to bow down for her, kiss her feet, or say prayers to her. It's a symbol of the law, just like a cross is a symbol of christianity and a colander is a symbol of the great flying spagetti monster.

[LunarSage]

As to the courthouse thing... look up the separation of church and state.  It's a big thing in the US.

[Deamonbane]

Agh... right you are... I withdraw my statement...

[Oniya]

Not to mention, the pro-birth crowd considers abortion to be murder, so it falls under number 6.

[Deamonbane]

You are right again, but I am not part of the pro-birth crowd, and still a Christian... so I don't see it that way... Of course, Brazil is a predominantly Catholic country, and there are no anti-abortion laws in place... so Us christians can't be all that bad *winks*...

Please don't read this the wrong way... I know that there have been some 'Christians' have given us a bad name, but they are the exceptions, not the rule...

[Oniya]

You are right again, but I am not part of the pro-birth crowd, and still a Christian... so I don't see it that way... Of course, Brazil is a predominantly Catholic country, and there are no anti-abortion laws in place... so Us christians can't be all that bad *winks*...

Please don't read this the wrong way... I know that there have been some 'Christians' have given us a bad name, but they are the exceptions, not the rule...

That's why I specified them and not Christians as a whole. *winks back*

[Callie Del Noire]

Put yourself in the shoes of a woman suing to enjoin the state from invading her vagina with an ultrasonic probe so she can be forced to observe her fetus's heartbeat on a monitor before having an abortion. Don't you think she might find a display of the ten commandments over the courthouse doors a bit offputting?

I don't think this was a case of someone with too much time on his hands, at all. The suggestion inherent in such displays is that judges will be guided in their decisions by religious teachings. In a society that purports to be governed by secular principles, and claims to permit freedom of conscience for all, everyone should be appalled by the implicit message.

The thing was, from what I took out of that interview, all those years ago was this: he was LOOKING for reasons to push into the courts and rub the local's nose in it. Yeah I get separation of church and state and all that.

But I also try to live by Will Wheaton's sage advice: don't be a dick. 

This guy was going out of his way to be one.  The vibe I was getting from the interview was 'I's smarter and more enlightened than these local yokels and I'm really doing them a favor, because ya know. .there really ain't no god'

Di it but be nice to olks, no reason to be a dick.

[Deamonbane]

That's why I specified them and not Christians as a whole. *winks back*

So you did... thanks for that

[Stattick]

I feel like I'm the only one that read the linked article. Maybe it's just that I'm the only one that thought that this was a good thing that happened and had a good resolution?

So normally, Santa Monica had a big old huge nativity scene in the local, publicly owned city park. Now normally what happens these days, is that some people don't like the nativity scenes (or maybe it's a GIANT CROSS in the park, or Bible verse at the court house, or whatever). Maybe they're not Christian. Maybe the religion has done bad things to them or their loved ones in the past. Maybe they just strongly believe in the separation of church and state and think that public lands/buildings should not be a billboard for specific religions. Maybe they have other reasons, or some combination of the above reasons. It doesn't matter - to them, the religious stuff on public land is offensive. On private land - well, people can and do put up whatever the hell they want on private land. People leave Obama hanged in effigy from the trees in their front yard and no one can do a damn thing about it because it's covered under the first amendment as free speech. But on public lands, we don't have to put up with religions bullying their way in and making everyone look at their stuff.

Normally what happens, is that one or more people sue or get the ACLU to sue on their behalf to have the religious stuff taken down because of separation of church and state. Then there's a long, expensive court battle. This time, someone just went to the city and asked for equal representation. The city said, "Ok, fine." So the dude put up a sign where he was told that he could put up a sign, that read, “Religions are all alike — founded upon fables and mythologies.” That's a famous quote by Thomas Jefferson by the way. The article implies that he might have had some other stuff written or up in his display, but it didn't detail what. I'm pretty sure that it wasn't anything really bad or newsworthy, otherwise they would have emphasized it.

You have to remember that this is PUBLIC LAND. This is supposed to an area that's for EVERYONE'S usage, not just Christians. It's unfair for one group to put up the equivalent of a billboard in the park, while no one else gets to put anything. It shows a bias for government choosing one group over another. It's intrinsically unfair to anyone that's not in the group that gets to put up their display. That's why the Supreme Court of the United States of America has ruled that in situations like these on public land, that someone else that comes along and asks for equal space shall be given it. So, the Catholic Church has a big giant nativity scene in the public park? Well, if the Jewish Temple wants to put up a giant menorah or Star of David, they have to be given equal space. If someone else wants to put up a giant Flying Spaghetti Monster, they too must be given space. And if I want to put up a kung fu Buddha ripping the spraying, bleeding heart out of dragon and devouring the heart because I think that's super rad, they have to give me equal space too, God help you all.

Um... where was I? Oh... Actually, that was three years ago. Last year, he told other people that they should put in their own applications for equal time, and some did. A Jewish group won a spot and put up something. Some atheists won some spots, and the church won two spots. They had to reduce the size of their display by 7 times, to get it down from 14 spots to 2. Last year, there was some vandalism of one of the atheist's places.

This year, the city decided not to deal with the hassle, the vandalism, or the politics. They're just not allowing ANY public displays. So the churches sued the city, because they still wanted to put up their religious thing in the park, even though the city said "no". The judge tossed the case out; the city is within its rights.

Well, Santa Monica has over 50 churches, so I'm pretty sure that they can find some private land to put up their display in. Meanwhile, people who want to go out and stroll in the park don't have to be assailed with turning a corner and suddenly finding themselves in Jesus Land. Granted, most people probably wouldn't care, and some people would be happy about it, but others would find it highly offensive.

So, it took a few years for it to all play out, but the government didn't have to spend a bunch of time defending itself in court. The only people who are out any money would be the church groups who filed the motion. Filing the suit probably didn't cost a whole lot, but they might have had to pay for their lawyer if they didn't have someone doing it pro bono.

Am I really the only here that sees this as a victory for the good guys? Because if so, that would be kind of sad.

[TheGlyphstone]

And if I want to put up a kung fu Buddha ripping the spraying, bleeding heart out of dragon and devouring the heart because I think that's super rad, they have to give me equal space too, God help you all.

Are you accepting converts? ;D

[Hemingway]

I couldn't find any pictures or quotes with the actual messages put up by the atheists. Without knowing what was actually there, it's sort of difficult to form an opinion.

The banners I've seen put up by atheist organizations in the past have been as inoffensive as can be. As far as vandalism, that really has nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with common human decency, or lack thereof.

[Callie Del Noire]

I will say that in the end.. the city did the most (financially) expedient thing considering that the past events. I see more and more cities doing this as the lawsuits come down the pipeline.

[Stattick]

The US is not a Christian nation. We aren't a theocracy. We shouldn't give Christians an unfair ability to put up Christian specific imagery or messages on public lands, public buildings, and so forth. Christians only account for 73% of the US population (CITE). It was 78% just 5 years ago. So, the recent trend has been for the percentage of Americans that consider themselves Christian to drop by 1% per year. Meanwhile, the number of atheists, agnostics, and people of non-Christian faith (like me) continues to rise.

Christians still have unparallelled power in this nation. They have more advertising dollars, people walking around knocking on doors, people advertising on TV or broadcasting services. These are things that most of the non-Christian community either cannot do, or doesn't have an interest in doing whatsoever. I mean, when's the last time someone came knocking on your door and tried to convert you Athiesm, Judiasm, Wicca, or Voudoo? I understand that some Christians feel like their faith is under attack because they're having to take the 10 Commandments out of their court houses, or not put up the traditional manger scene in front of the Town Hall. But non-Christians feel like they're under attack all the time in this country. We're just trying to get the majority to cut it back a bit, and to take their religion out of our government and the public places that our tax dollars pay for, and to show some consideration for those not of their faith. I don't think that's unreasonable.

[Callie Del Noire]

I agree.. I just wonder if sometimes some of the intent behind some of these actions are a bit of a 'because I can'...

That being said, I think that this time the city did the right thing. In the end, just from the sheer frustration and costs of it..this is the most logical action they could take.

I think that it would make for a much sadder place if this is what kills Christmas lights where I live though. I grew up loving the lights and festiveness of the season.

I really hate polically correct life sometimes.

[Stattick]

I agree.. I just wonder if sometimes some of the intent behind some of these actions are a bit of a 'because I can'...

That being said, I think that this time the city did the right thing. In the end, just from the sheer frustration and costs of it..this is the most logical action they could take.

Yeah, in this case I agree.

I think that it would make for a much sadder place if this is what kills Christmas lights where I live though. I grew up loving the lights and festiveness of the season.

Yeah, agreed. I don't think anything's going to change people's ability to put up whatever they want on their own property though. That should be protected speech. Same thing with businesses, clubs, churches, and so forth - they too should be able to put up whatever they want.

I really hate polically correct life sometimes.

Yeah... me too. There've been times where I've gotten pretty cheesed off about someone or some group telling me that I shouldn't say something that I've been saying for years, or doing something that I've been doing for years, or something that I like is under attack. My knee jerk reaction isn't any better or more enlightened than anyone else's. I'm usually a bit angry, and I automatically want to resist whatever the proposed change is. Most of the time I come around though, after I've seen enough to convince myself that it isn't a passing fad, and that whatever it is that they want changed has a basis in reality - usually that it's hurtful to some group of people. I swear, I got verbally piled on once for saying, "That's gay" to something when I was in the car with a gay roommate and his three gay friends. It took quite some time before they were able to convince me that they weren't being overly sensitive and that using "That's gay" as a pejorative is genuinely unfair and hurtful to gay people. Political correctness is never fun, and is a real pain in the ass sometimes. But most of the time there is a genuine issue that someone's trying to correct there, and most of the time it boils down to, "Please don't say/do that anymore, it's hurtful to me and to other people like me."

[Serephino]

Starting all this shit over a nativity scene is the dumbest thing I've ever...  Seriously, I see no point in getting offended.  Yes, it was on public land, and yes, I agree that other people should be able to share space.  However, the Atheists putting stuff up there about there being no god, I see that as them being dicks.  There was no reason for that other than to put down religion.  It was not needed.

I'm Pagan, and if someone wishes me a Merry Christmas, I return the sentiment.  They don't have a crystal ball to tell what my religious beliefs are, and it's not worth getting all worked up over.  The person is simply trying to be friendly.  Personally, I'd like to encourage others being friendly and courteous.  I don't see it nearly enough anymore.  Sometimes this PC world of ours goes to unnecessary extremes, and it drives me nuts.

[Callie Del Noire]

I look on it as this.. they wish me well.. I return the favor. As a .. very.. lapsed Episcopalian I don't see myself as particularly anything. I simply wish more folks would look beyond an excuse to get hurt sometimes. I agree that 'some phrases' should be toned down or eliminated, but I don't get bent out of shape when someone calls me 'cracker'. (And for THREE reasons I get that)

[ulthakptah]

I doubt it, she stands for believing in fair trials. Even atheists will be hard-pressed to be against that. ;)

It also helps that you don't have to bow down for her, kiss her feet, or say prayers to her. It's a symbol of the law, just like a cross is a symbol of christianity and a colander is a symbol of the great flying spagetti monster.

Pretty sure they weren't making people bow down and pray to the ten commandments. I think they just had them in there as a symbol for law. Seeing as they are a very early example of written law that most likely lead to the laws in place today.

Not to mention, the pro-birth crowd considers abortion to be murder, so it falls under number 6.

PETA says killing animals is murder, and that doesn't have diddly to do with the ten commandments.

Am I really the only here that sees this as a victory for the good guys? Because if so, that would be kind of sad.

Well I see it as a victory for those specific atheists, but I wouldn't say the good guys. It is a nativity scene not a giant sign with 'Atheists will burn forever in a fiery hell.' written on it. If the atheists who won the lot just put in some festive decorations that would have been just fine, but no they wanted to be dicks. They put up signs that I can only imagine attacks religion with hate and malice. Which they were in their legal right to do, but it still made them dicks. The Westboro Baptist Church are legally allowed to picket around with hateful signs, but they are still dicks too. And if they manage to cause so much trouble that the city/state/government has to ban protesting, I wouldn't consider that a win for the good guys either. In the end those atheists got to fill all the 21 lots with exactly what they believed in.

Oh, and the vandalizing of the signs would be in poor taste if it was the church who in fact did it. However there is always the chance someone just vandalized the sign because they like to vandalize signs. Like blacking out letters to make it say something silly, example "I have a Chardonnay"

[LunarSage]

My opinion, but I strongly doubt that the vandals were anything but Christians, considering the circumstances.  The nativity scenes that were there were untouched.  Just like the local abortion clinic in the area I used to live in (which was right down the street from a Catholic church) was burned to the ground... I refuse to believe the arsonists were anything but insane Christians who thought they were helping their 'cause'. 

I'm Christian with Agnostic leanings, myself.  Some of the things that some people who call themselves Christians do sickens me.

[Vekseid]

Starting all this shit over a nativity scene is the dumbest thing I've ever...  Seriously, I see no point in getting offended.  Yes, it was on public land, and yes, I agree that other people should be able to share space.  However, the Atheists putting stuff up there about there being no god, I see that as them being dicks.  There was no reason for that other than to put down religion.  It was not needed.

I'm Pagan, and if someone wishes me a Merry Christmas, I return the sentiment.  They don't have a crystal ball to tell what my religious beliefs are, and it's not worth getting all worked up over.  The person is simply trying to be friendly.  Personally, I'd like to encourage others being friendly and courteous.  I don't see it nearly enough anymore.  Sometimes this PC world of ours goes to unnecessary extremes, and it drives me nuts.

I don't see the point in intentionally pressing, however. At best it just comes off as rude. There are plenty of freethinker/humanist messages that don't involve tearing others down.

[Stattick]

Well I see it as a victory for those specific atheists, but I wouldn't say the good guys. It is a nativity scene not a giant sign with 'Atheists will burn forever in a fiery hell.' written on it. If the atheists who won the lot just put in some festive decorations that would have been just fine, but no they wanted to be dicks. They put up signs that I can only imagine attacks religion with hate and malice. Which they were in their legal right to do, but it still made them dicks. The Westboro Baptist Church are legally allowed to picket around with hateful signs, but they are still dicks too. And if they manage to cause so much trouble that the city/state/government has to ban protesting, I wouldn't consider that a win for the good guys either. In the end those atheists got to fill all the 21 lots with exactly what they believed in.

Yeah, it's kind of a dick move. It's also kind of a dick move to put your religion all over the park or in the court house, where people not of your religion are going to have to have it right in their face. Personally, I don't ANYONE's religion should be in public places. It shouldn't be on the money, in the pledge, in the courtroom, in the park, and whatnot. What churches want to put up on their private property, or what people want to put up in their yard is fine, but there shouldn't be GIANT STEEL CROSSES in parks and whatnot. (Yeah, one of the towns I lived in for a long time had a giant steel cross in it... and one of the local churches would do Easter services there.)

[ulthakptah]

Yeah, it's kind of a dick move. It's also kind of a dick move to put your religion all over the park or in the court house, where people not of your religion are going to have to have it right in their face. Personally, I don't ANYONE's religion should be in public places. It shouldn't be on the money, in the pledge, in the courtroom, in the park, and whatnot. What churches want to put up on their private property, or what people want to put up in their yard is fine, but there shouldn't be GIANT STEEL CROSSES in parks and whatnot. (Yeah, one of the towns I lived in for a long time had a giant steel cross in it... and one of the local churches would do Easter services there.)

Wouldn't banning religion in public places be the government favoring atheism though?

[Callie Del Noire]

Wouldn't banning religion in public places be the government favoring atheism though?

Which is why they didn't BAN anything..

They simply went.. 'We can't satisfy anyone with our prior solutions so we're stopping the practice all together'.

Simple and to the point.

[Vekseid]

Wouldn't banning religion in public places be the government favoring atheism though?

Not so much that as interfering with religious (protected) speech. The government should not -sponsor- religious speech. There is a clear difference.

[ulthakptah]

It's not that simple. The lack of theological symbols in a public places is a representation of atheism. So by removing the ten commandments, bible verses, nativity scenes, and whatever from public places is still the government favoring one religion over another.

[Oniya]

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

[Stattick]

Atheism ain't a religion.

[Callie Del Noire]

Atheism ain't a religion.

Maybe.. but it is a belief.. just like religion..and I think we've demonstrated that Atheists can be just as rude, outspoken and zealous as any worshiper of a given faith.

[vtboy]

It's not that simple. The lack of theological symbols in a public places is a representation of atheism. So by removing the ten commandments, bible verses, nativity scenes, and whatever from public places is still the government favoring one religion over another.

Absolutely false. How is the absence of religious symbols from public places a representation of atheism? That one does not endorse one thing is not an endorsement of its competitor. 

The reason there are no religious symbols in public places is not that our government has chosen atheism over faith, but that religion is simply not its province. Our government is supposed to be secular. Where religion is concerned, its only role is to protect the rights of all to believe as they choose; it is not to festoon civic property with the trappings of religion (or of atheism, if there are such things).

You're free to erect a crucifix on your roof, perform morality plays on your front lawn, and thump a bible from dawn to dusk. Government is not. What is so hard to understand about this?

[Oreo]

I have no real opinion either way, but why are only certain aspects of religion being taken off public property? Doesn't the White House erect a tree every year? Don't cities festoon the streets with lights and flying reindeer at the cost of the citizens? Where is the difference? Feel free to smack me if my logic is off.

[Oniya]

The tree, the lights, and the flying reindeer are multicultural.  The Nativity scene in particular is exclusive to Christianity.

[ulthakptah]

Absolutely false. How is the absence of religious symbols from public places a representation of atheism? That one does not endorse one thing is not an endorsement of its competitor. 

The reason there are no religious symbols in public places is not that our government has chosen atheism over faith, but that religion is simply not its province. Our government is supposed to be secular. Where religion is concerned, its only role is to protect the rights of all to believe as they choose; it is not to festoon civic property with the trappings of religion (or of atheism, if there are such things).

You're free to erect a crucifix on your roof, perform morality plays on your front lawn, and thump a bible from dawn to dusk. Government is not. What is so hard to understand about this?

Absolutely false? I wonder if I should even continue trying to make a point after that...

Lack was probably a bad use of word on my part. If a public building is made and there are no religious symbols then fine. However it's when the government is forced to ban and remove any object, decorations, and so forth that have religious tones to it is there a problem. "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof" Not "religious symbols being used in decorations is unconstitutional and a violation of church and state". Really the whole point of separation church and state is to promote religious tolerance among people. Personally I think it isn't very tolerant if a religion's symbols are banned from public places.

More importantly symbols only have power if you let them have power. The only thing I think of when I see a star of David is two equilateral triangles intersecting each other, and in no way does that make me not want to eat bacon.

[vtboy]

Lack was probably a bad use of word on my part. If a public building is made and there are no religious symbols then fine. However it's when the government is forced to ban and remove any object, decorations, and so forth that have religious tones to it is there a problem.

Government is only forced to remove religious symbols from public property when it has made the error of putting them there in the first place. Occasionally, these things may go without redress for some period of time, perhaps due to apathy or to supportive sentiment in the local community. That those who force the issue may often be atheists does not make removal of the religious symbols an endorsement of atheism or an assault on religion. To the extent some people may take away some unintended message from the removal of religious matter, the problem is the creation of those who put the stuff up in the first place, not of those who insist on strict secularism in our governmental institutions.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof" Not "religious symbols being used in decorations is unconstitutional and a violation of church and state". Really the whole point of separation church and state is to promote religious tolerance among people. Personally I think it isn't very tolerant if a religion's symbols are banned from public places.

The Constitution is a short document, containing some very imprecise language. Strict textualism has been rejected by most jurists and constitutional scholars as not only virtually impossible in practice, but also as contrary to the intentions of the framers that future generations interpret the document in a manner consistent with the needs and understandings of their own times. The establishment and free exercise clauses do not say anything about school prayer, or providing financial support to churches, yet it is well settled constitutional law that these are within their prohibition.

I can't imagine where you got the idea that the purpose of the establishment and free exercise clauses is to promote religious tolerance. Their purpose was to keep the levers of power out of the hands of all religious groups, so they could not bludgeon each other to death with them. Interestingly, evangelists, who were then frequently scorned by established churches, were among the strongest advocates of the clauses.

More importantly symbols only have power if you let them have power. The only thing I think of when I see a star of David is two equilateral triangles intersecting each other, and in no way does that make me not want to eat bacon.

Well, I suppose if we were all as perfect as you, we wouldn't need the First Amendment at all. Being one of the less perfect, I would prefer that my six year old son not pass under a crucifix or a star of David or an Islamic crescent as he enters the doors of his grammar school. 

[Stattick]

Maybe.. but it is a belief.. just like religion..and I think we've demonstrated that Atheists can be just as rude, outspoken and zealous as any worshiper of a given faith.

Atheism isn't a belief; it's a lack of belief.

Let's imagine it this way: Take a huge group of people, and then separate them according to belief. For the first group, it's everyone that believes in Muhammad. For the second group, it's everyone that doesn't believe in Muhammad. These two groups are nothing alike. One group has a lot of common beliefs. They're far more likely to all know Arabic, have a familiarity with the Koran, and so forth. Sure, they'll have some internal strife - the group that believes in Muhammad is going to contain both sunni and shia, and possibly some others as well, such as Kurds, Dervishes, and Bahá'í.

Meanwhile, the other group is composed of Christians, Jews, Pagans, Buddhists, Atheists, Hindus, Shamans, Agnostics, Catholics, Mormons, Scientologists, Heathens, and so forth. There's no commonality there, except that they don't accept Muhammad as their god. They don't worship together, have rituals in common, have language in common, or anything. One group is a group with significant religious, philosophical, ritual, and traditional ties, and the other is just a group of random people.

Now apply the analogy to atheists. Atheists are just a random group of people. They don't worship together. They don't have any significant religious, philosophical, ritual, or traditional ties together. They have no community. They don't get together on Sundays to have sing alongs, and to study Darwin's theories. Furthermore, when you add in the agnostics, undecideds, and the people who only go to church/temple/services/whatever because they don't want to make waves in their family and/or community, you get a huge range of different belief systems. You have Jews that go to service because it's expected of them, but they don't believe in the faith at all. I've known nonbeliever Catholics that just go to church a few times a year to satisfy their religious spouse. I've known people that just go to church once in a while because their parents expect them to, but they don't believe. There are plenty of people who just aren't sure what to believe, and when you get right down to it, they might believe in some sort of ill defined and nebulous higher power, but they don't believe in the God of the Bible that they were raised with. Then you have people that are strictly atheist, that don't believe in anything that even smacks a bit of the supernatural. But when you get down to the philosophies of the atheists, you discover that they have a wide range of different philosophies. Some might be atheist Buddhists, others are secular humanists, while others yet might follow LaVey style Satanism. They have no commonality or community in regards to morality or ethics. They're just a random group of people that have a single, common trait - they don't believe in God.

It's like gathering together all the people with brown eyes, and calling them a cohesive group. They're not. They just happen to have a single trait in common.

[Vekseid]

It's not that simple. The lack of theological symbols in a public places is a representation of atheism. So by removing the ten commandments, bible verses, nativity scenes, and whatever from public places is still the government favoring one religion over another.

No, that's a representation of secularism.

That you find anything special about its lack is actually the core of the problem.

Imagine if, everywhere, you saw a murdered child nailed to a stick, along with public displays of vaginas, because these things are important to some faith. And if you didn't like seeing murdered children nailed to sticks, or public displays of vaginas, and wanted that taken down, that was called you 'promoting' your religion over theirs. You are un-murdered child nailed to a stick/anti-public vaginas, and wanting those things not shoved so forcefully in your face - i.e. your tax dollars going to them, is 'religion' according to you.

[Deamonbane]

Shoving it into a person's face is different than having it somewhere as a symbol... not to mention that a declaration of religious laws, against it though you may be, are entirely different than what you are saying...

Atheist require just as much faith as theists, btw... because, well, if I was to ask you to prove that there isn't a God, you would be equally as stumped aas I would be if you asked me to prove that there is a God... hence, you 'believe' that there is no God... Faith has nothing to do with religion... it has to do with how you follow it... Atheists do so differently than the others, and that is what makes them special...

[Avis habilis]

No. Proving a negative is a logical impossibility. Atheists don't have faith that there is no god. They're unconvinced that there is one.

[Deamonbane]

As is proving that there is a God... So where does it end?

[Moraline]

Just to comment on what happened.

I'm not religious, I don't believe in any God.

With that said, I would have kicked over the anti-religious signs in broad daylight, right in front of the people that posted them.

The lots are given out for Xmas displays. It's supposed to be a fun holiday time. Yes, I know the religious types like to cram their religion down peoples throats this time of year.. but whatever... I just wish them a Merry Xmas and be on my way.

There's a time and a place for protesting. This wasn't one of them.

The lots this year were given out in a fair and equitable manor through a random draw. Now go to your lots and put up your holiday displays or give it to someone else that wants to.

[Avis habilis]

As is proving that there is a God...

No. You can prove that something exists by producing evidence for it. Now, it may be a practical impossibility, but it wouldn't be a logical one.

[Deamonbane]

Point... however, even if I did show you what would amount to me to be evidence that God exists, you would immediately point out that I am wrong, either by disbelieving that it happened, or placing tags such as 'coincidence' and 'luck' and other such things... which means that, to me, to be an unbeliever, you have a great deal of faith...

[Valerian]

Atheist require just as much faith as theists, btw... because, well, if I was to ask you to prove that there isn't a God, you would be equally as stumped aas I would be if you asked me to prove that there is a God... hence, you 'believe' that there is no God... Faith has nothing to do with religion... it has to do with how you follow it... Atheists do so differently than the others, and that is what makes them special...

Well, no, that isn't the point.  You're getting caught up in semantics, I think.  'Believe' does not automatically have religious connotations.  Scientists believe that dark matter exists, but they can't conclusively prove it as yet.

Point... however, even if I did show you what would amount to me to be evidence that God exists, you would immediately point out that I am wrong, either by disbelieving that it happened, or placing tags such as 'coincidence' and 'luck' and other such things... which means that, to me, to be an unbeliever, you have a great deal of faith...

You shouldn't assume what the reactions of others would be to truly conclusive proof.  Also, if the proof doesn't stand up to questioning or leaves room for doubt, then it isn't really proof.

[Deamonbane]

And Christians believe that God exists, and yet lack the power to prove it in a way that will convince people that don't want to be convinced... You want me to produce physical evidence of God's existence? I can't. However, I can prove to you that my believing in Him has changed my life, and that of many people that I know for the better, if only with what you would consider to be false hope. Would you take that as evidence that a God exists, or would you simply jot it down do a sudden attack of conscience appeasement? To me, it leaves no room for doubt, and is very conclusive... for you, well, that be up to you, and I will respect what you believe until you give me reason to do otherwise, by either ridiculing me for believing differently than you, or by considering me to be inferior because of it...

[Avis habilis]

Would you take that as evidence that a God exists ...

No, because it wouldn't be. It would be evidence that believing one exists has changed your life.

[Deamonbane]

My point exactly.... How am I supposed to make you believe in something that you will refuse to believe in until you see concrete proof of it? It is like trying to prove someone's motive for committing a crime in the court of law when they don't want to talk about it... Not only is it a moot point, it is impossible... I could go on and on about how happenings worldwide were predicted by the Bible, about modern-day prophets, and talk until my jaw falls off, and it wouldn't make a lick of difference, because, to you, it won't come up as concrete evidence...

That being said, I won't shove anything down your throat. You either want to believe, or you don't... I won't waste my time trying to make the proverbial horse drink water(forgive the proverb), and know that if you do the same, I will respect you all the more for it, and we could even become friends...

[Stattick]

As is proving that there is a God... So where does it end?

No. Proving that something does exist or is real is exactly what science is about. Through science, we can prove that the dodo bird once existed. We have drawings. We have fossils. We have first hand accounts of their behavior. We have specimens. Hell, we might even have DNA of them. The one time existence of the dodo is not up for debate. This is how science works.

As to the existence of God or the supernatural, the evidence is far more scarce. That doesn't mean that God or the supernatural don't exist, but that from a strict scientific standpoint, that it isn't proven. But just because something isn't proven doesn't mean that it doesn't exist.

As far as proving the existence of the supernatural, well you have to consider an old maxim in science: the more extraordinary the claim, the more extraordinary the evidence required to prove its existence. So, the claims as to what God can do are quite extraordinary: he can create life instantly, bring back the dead, and apparently ignore some or all of the laws of physics. We'd need a hell of a lot of proof before most scientists would accept the existence of God. As for proof or evidence, all we really have are some supposed miracles that have happened from time to time, and some people that think that they've seen God and/or had him communicate to them or through them, often via dreams or possession. Most of the miracles weren't or couldn't be verified by science. Most of the cases of people claiming to have knowledge of God through some sort of supernatural means have also failed to yield evidence of the supernatural. There's a large volume of prophesies that have not come true, and a volume of prophesies that some claim have come true, but were so vaguely written originally as to make us wonder if it was just wishful thinking on the part of those that claim it came true. There are a rare few prophesies that were clearly written that seem to have come true, but some of those have been shown to have been written after the supposed prophesy occurred. There's almost no evidence in the realm of proving the supernatural that has been accepted as valid proof by scientists. Therefore if one wants to believe in God or the supernatural, they must primarily rely on faith that it exists. Although they might have had direct experiences that seems to point to the existence of the supernatural, in most cases, what they experienced could not be considered direct proof, and even if it could be, in most cases it wasn't studied and subjected to scientific scrutiny.

For instance, I've directly experienced things that lead me to the inescapable conclusion that the supernatural exists. It may very well be that everything that I've experienced has a mundane explanation, but if so, reality is a lot weirder than we give it credit for. But I can't prove anything by my experiences. Hell, I can't even prove that they really happened, and aren't false memories or a short term psychotic break on my part. No scientist would accept my "evidence", because it's all just memory; there were no recordings of any sort that occurred to even prove that events took place as I remember them, much less anything else. Hell, you can't even prove anything by the time I magicked my girlfriend's car into starting despite the fact that it had a dead battery, or two times I've made it rain - all of those could have just been coincidence. And I'll tell you this - I probably couldn't replicate those results on demand, and that automagically means that it wasn't science. Science can be duplicated. Science gives consistent results. Magick doesn't. Or perhaps magick does give consistent results, but we're unable to sense one or more necessary components of it. For instance, maybe a wish for rain will always work, if you've attracted the right kind of spirits to go make the weather change, and they want to help - but if we can't see those spirits, well from our vantage, from the world of science, every attempt at using magick to shape the world around us looks like a crap shoot.

[Vekseid]

hence, you 'believe' that there is no God...

I have never, in my entire life, made such a claim, or stated such a belief. This is in fact true for many who do not consider themselves theists.

I am not telling you what you believe.

I would kindly ask that you not tell me that I hold some belief that I do not.

This sort of thing is why I label myself a nontheist rather than atheist. At least if someone has the courtesy to ask it can be explained.

Shoving it into a person's face is different than having it somewhere as a symbol... not to mention that a declaration of religious laws, against it though you may be, are entirely different than what you are saying...

Making someone pay for its display whether or not they ascribe to it is the issue at hand. It's not just shoving it in my face - it's charging me for the privilege.

Faith has nothing to do with religion... it has to do with how you follow it... Atheists do so differently than the others, and that is what makes them special...

Faith is belief without a foundation built on empirical knowledge and conclusions logically derived.

[Avis habilis]

That being said, I won't shove anything down your throat. You either want to believe, or you don't... I won't waste my time trying to make the proverbial horse drink water(forgive the proverb), and know that if you do the same, I will respect you all the more for it, and we could even become friends...

Sounds good to me. Better than squabbling about it by a long shot.

[Valerian]

I have almost zero knowledge of any of the western religions, so correct me if I'm wrong, but don't many Christian groups follow the principle that any proof is impossible and/or contradictory?  In other words, while members of a Christian church standing up and relating their religious experiences might be inspiring, it wouldn't constitute actual proof of god's existence even to other faithful members.

[Deamonbane]

I have almost zero knowledge of any of the western religions, so correct me if I'm wrong, but don't many Christian groups follow the principle that any proof is impossible and/or contradictory?  In other words, while members of a Christian church standing up and relating their religious experiences might be inspiring, it wouldn't constitute actual proof of god's existence even to other faithful members.

To us, it constitutes as much evidence of God's existence as hundreds of witnesses watching someone commit murder, mainly because similar things has happened to the rest...

I would kindly ask that you not tell me that I hold some belief that I do not.

This sort of thing is why I label myself a nontheist rather than atheist. At least if someone has the courtesy to ask it can be explained.

Making someone pay for its display whether or not they ascribe to it is the issue at hand. It's not just shoving it in my face - it's charging me for the privilege.

Faith is belief without a foundation built on empirical knowledge and conclusions logically derived.

I didn't mean it that way(although, reading it now, I see that it came off as that), and I apologize for that.

In my mind, the fact that the universe, apparently so orderly once, and now falling rapidly into disrepair, shows evidence of a Designer, the same way that a car, coming nice and good out of a factory, and, as use begins to wear at it, as well as improper use... Of course, that is my point of view, and I would gladly listen to yours, and not criticize it(if I do, you may smack me over the head*nods*)...

I don't know about that paying taxes part of it, but if that happens, you have every right to tell them to shove off... of course, the same thing happens when Evolution is published in Textbooks for public schools, using my tax dollars(please, I am not trying to turn this into a Creationist vs Evolutionist Debate, but merely making a point)

It is very logical in my mind, but that is from my point of view... not yours, and therefore, you have every right to disbelieve it...

[Stattick]

The universe isn't coming apart. All the stars are in the same places we'd expect for them to be, through thousands of years of direct observation. Do some stars move? Sure... and we now have theories that show with a mathematical precision that's downright breathtaking as to how and why the stars move the way that they do, and in almost all cases, we can show exactly why the stars move the way that they do. As a matter of fact, we can even see the slight wobbles in their movement, and know that it's evidence of a planet or other dark body, and then find that planet or dark body in orbit around that star. Biology hasn't gone wonky, chemistry works the same as it always has, physics is as steadfast as always. I honestly have no clue as to what you mean by saying that the universe is falling apart.

[Oniya]

I honestly have no clue as to what you mean by saying that the universe is falling apart.

I was interpreting that line as an expression of entropy  (Which has been scientifically researched.)

[Vekseid]

I didn't mean it that way(although, reading it now, I see that it came off as that), and I apologize for that.

Thank you.

In my mind, the fact that the universe, apparently so orderly once, and now falling rapidly into disrepair, shows evidence of a Designer, the same way that a car, coming nice and good out of a factory, and, as use begins to wear at it, as well as improper use... Of course, that is my point of view, and I would gladly listen to yours, and not criticize it(if I do, you may smack me over the head*nods*)...

Criticism is fine. It shows you where cracks might be.

Entropy is the cost of being able to perceive time, however. We might actually be going backwards in time, continually 'reperfecting', and our perception of the progress of time is in fact backwards.

This is the crux of it - being able to perceive the passage of time means that you must see the overall state of things as one of decay. You can reverse it locally - the Sun for instance provides Earth with a great deal of negative entropy - but Earth gets a mere two billionth of the Sun's light, and of that two billionth, most of that energy ends up being cast off anyway.

I don't know about that paying taxes part of it, but if that happens, you have every right to tell them to shove off... of course, the same thing happens when Evolution is published in Textbooks for public schools, using my tax dollars(please, I am not trying to turn this into a Creationist vs Evolutionist Debate, but merely making a point)

And yet you just did. You're complaining about the teaching of objective facts.

We know all of evolution, save for common descent, to be a fact in the same way we know the Sun rises in the East. Not only is it a fact, our understanding of evolution is critical to our quality of life. We would be worse off without such understanding, as just about every vaccine is made with such knowledge, and the current crisis with antibiotic resistant bacteria well shows. And while common descent has not been observed in its entirety, the evidence for it is still fact, and applying this understanding is profoundly useful for a great deal of research, that also improves your quality of life.

Compare to being forced to pay for idolatry, or actual religious programs.

[Vodka]

To comment at the article on hand, I'm an atheist. I'm proud of my atheism. I'll talk about it with anyone who wants and I'll debate about it if the chance arises.

That being said, things like this is what gives atheists a bad name. It sounds to me like this was nothing more than an attempt to get a rise out of a few Christians. Why bother? Is it not enough to simply accept that we live in a world full of different beliefs? Is it really so impossible to let everyone believe what they want to believe without cramming your own propaganda down their throats? I mean, don't get me wrong, there's a heavy saturation of Christianity in the U.S. as well, but this seems like nothing more than fighting fire with fire.

Meh.

[Deamonbane]

Thank you.

Criticism is fine. It shows you where cracks might be.

Entropy is the cost of being able to perceive time, however. We might actually be going backwards in time, continually 'reperfecting', and our perception of the progress of time is in fact backwards.

This is the crux of it - being able to perceive the passage of time means that you must see the overall state of things as one of decay. You can reverse it locally - the Sun for instance provides Earth with a great deal of negative entropy - but Earth gets a mere two billionth of the Sun's light, and of that two billionth, most of that energy ends up being cast off anyway.

And yet you just did. You're complaining about the teaching of objective facts.

We know all of evolution, save for common descent, to be a fact in the same way we know the Sun rises in the East. Not only is it a fact, our understanding of evolution is critical to our quality of life. We would be worse off without such understanding, as just about every vaccine is made with such knowledge, and the current crisis with antibiotic resistant bacteria well shows. And while common descent has not been observed in its entirety, the evidence for it is still fact, and applying this understanding is profoundly useful for a great deal of research, that also improves your quality of life.

Compare to being forced to pay for idolatry, or actual religious programs.

I have been presented with more evidence than I would care to talk about that Evolution is a hoax, a fraud, and the 'evidence' that has been presented for it has been time and time again been disproven by scientists in the field, ones that weren't being sponsored by people interested in them finding evidence that proves evolution. However, as this isn't a Creationist vs. Evolutionist thread, and I would be more than happy to discuss this, in a manner in which religion is not involved (because, well, I am thinking that there is as little chance that you will be convinced that the Universe was created in six days as there is a chance of me believing in the Big Bang)... However, the point remaining is that I have seen, in current Textbooks, facts that have been very firmly disproved by the scientific world 50 years ago, and I don't like that my tax payer's dollars are going to spreading stuff like that. That being said, I agree firmly with you, and if you are paying towards the upkeep of something that you normally would have no business even looking at, then you have every right in the world to get the government on the case of said object, to, if not get rid of it, then at least make sure that you don't have to pay for it.

I personally have no idea what you are talking about an expression of entropy, so that means that I am probably wrong, and you are right... however, looking over the everything, showing that everything has balance until man comes around and disrupts it, I find it rather hard to believe that all of this came together by chance, which was my point to begin with. I am not saying that you believe that, I am just saying that I do not.

But I agree with Vodka. The Arguing over these subjects brings out the worst in any kind of person, including myself(I recall very vividly having made a  complete fool of myself not too long ago), and, while discussing these subjects over dinner, with a nice something to drink, is great! But actually forcing what you do and do not believe down someone's throat is bad business for all involved, and I apologize if I have ever seemed like doing this. However, scientific rights and wrongs are not beliefs, and I more than welcome being called a complete idiot if I have it all wrong.

[Stattick]

I have been presented with more evidence than I would care to talk about that Evolution is a hoax, a fraud, and the 'evidence' that has been presented for it has been time and time again been disproven by scientists in the field...

No you haven't. You might think you have, but you haven't. Some creationists are pretty good at manufacturing fake evidence, particularly for those that have a vested interest in being told what they want to believe.

Or would you care to provide citations for the creationist scientists that have published their proof in peer reviewed journals like any normal scientist would?

Evolution is the most studied theory in science. It's the most proven theory in science. If evolution is wrong, then it means that most of our other sciences are wrong as well. Biology, chemistry, geology, nuclear physics, dendrochronology, mathematics, and genetics would all have to be dead wrong. Millions of scientists would have to be lying constantly and consistantly, without ever breaking ranks to create the world's largest conspiracy to make it appear that evolution was true if it weren't. I prefer the simpler solution, that creationism is myth rather than to believe that all of science is a lie and that all scientists are liars. Besides, I can point at things that science has created, at things that science has improved upon in my lifetime. Whereas I cannot point at anything that religion has made better. Hell, probably half of the world population lives under the dictates of a religion that says that women are held in such low esteem that they cannot be priests.

[Aiden]

*Note* I did not read the 3 page discussion, just the article.


Dear Atheist,

I am far from being religious, but stopping fucking with my Christmas.

Dear Christians, Catholics, etc belief

Shut the hell up and stop putting the "Christ" in Christmas.

You are all assholes (atheist included), Shut the fuck up.

<3

Aiden

(This would be my billboard)

[ulthakptah]

No, that's a representation of secularism.

That you find anything special about its lack is actually the core of the problem.

Imagine if, everywhere, you saw a murdered child nailed to a stick, along with public displays of vaginas, because these things are important to some faith. And if you didn't like seeing murdered children nailed to sticks, or public displays of vaginas, and wanted that taken down, that was called you 'promoting' your religion over theirs. You are un-murdered child nailed to a stick/anti-public vaginas, and wanting those things not shoved so forcefully in your face - i.e. your tax dollars going to them, is 'religion' according to you.

How would I know that that the child was murdered? Am I living in a society where it is legal to murder children? And are they real children or just a display? Because if they are real I would be against it because of the the whole rotting corpse being unsanitary and bad for health.

I can't see a problem with the public displays of vaginas though. Frankly I could do with having more vagina shoved in my face. A better hyperbolic example would be penises, but seeing how I have been to public schools and restrooms, I've seen displays of that so often I'm already desensitized to it.

Anyway if it's just money thats the problem than what about this? http://cnsnews.com/news/article/judge-orders-bible-removed-monument-texas-courthouse

It's a story about a 50 year old monument that has a bible verse on it being removed even though it was paid with private funds.

Anyway back to the nativity, I don't think the state pays for those decorations either. If it's anything like the churches where I live they buy their own nativity scenes and store them when it's not Christmas.

[Stattick]

It's a story about a 50 year old monument that has a bible verse on it being removed even though it was paid with private funds.

Didn't you read the article? It was a lighted box that displayed an OPEN BIBLE in it. As an endorsement to specific religions, it had NO PLACE in the auditorium of a public courthouse. Bravo for the lawsuit and bravo for the brave woman that brought the suit that had the Bible removed. Hopefully no one's made good on the death threats she received for her efforts.

[Deamonbane]

No you haven't. You might think you have, but you haven't. Some creationists are pretty good at manufacturing fake evidence, particularly for those that have a vested interest in being told what they want to believe.

Or would you care to provide citations for the creationist scientists that have published their proof in peer reviewed journals like any normal scientist would?

Evolution is the most studied theory in science. It's the most proven theory in science. If evolution is wrong, then it means that most of our other sciences are wrong as well. Biology, chemistry, geology, nuclear physics, dendrochronology, mathematics, and genetics would all have to be dead wrong. Millions of scientists would have to be lying constantly and consistantly, without ever breaking ranks to create the world's largest conspiracy to make it appear that evolution was true if it weren't. I prefer the simpler solution, that creationism is myth rather than to believe that all of science is a lie and that all scientists are liars. Besides, I can point at things that science has created, at things that science has improved upon in my lifetime. Whereas I cannot point at anything that religion has made better. Hell, probably half of the world population lives under the dictates of a religion that says that women are held in such low esteem that they cannot be priests.

Like I said, I am not saying that Creation is right, even if I believe so. I am just saying that Evolution has been pointed out to be wrong a lot. And I would very much like to discuss this with you in a civil manner, without need for insults, and the putting of words in my mouth, in a Thread marked for such a thing, in which you can properly bash me over the head with my ignorance.

And as for Atheism, I haven't seem them create anything either. Whereas missionaries are all over the world, making it a better place by providing food, Medical expertise, and other such things to places that need it, whereas Christianity inspired men such as Mozart, Beethoven, and Michelangelo, I can't seem to recall one work of art inspired by Atheism. All I can recall is those guys sitting on their asses, laughing at how dumb Christians are. I am not saying that Christianity is the best. It also inspired such bad things as the massacres all over the Middle Ages, Crusades, and just about all the bad stuff in that time period. Science, however, hasn't done much better. It invented lots of bio-friendly crops. It has also developed  Biological weapons. It has also been responsible for good nuclear energy.  I could go on,, and on, and on about all the good and bad things that both religion and science have done for the world, but that would be beside the point. The point is that what the fuck are we fighting about? Nice, fun, healthy discussion is, as I said, fun. If you have to stoop to insulting merely because I am, in your eyes, misinformed, then, my friend, you should have a few history lessons about how good that went by in the past.

[Slywyn]

As far as I can tell he didn't insult you. He pointed out that evolution is one of the most scientifically proven theories in science to date. There are monumental piles of evidence to support it. I, personally, have never actually seen even one credible piece of evidence that remotedly disproves it.

I know personal experience goes not very far toward proving something, but I've see mountains of one and nothing of another.

[Deamonbane]

You might think you have, but you haven't.

I prefer the simpler solution, that creationism is myth rather than to believe that all of science is a lie and that all scientists are liars. Besides, I can point at things that science has created, at things that science has improved upon in my lifetime. Whereas I cannot point at anything that religion has made better. Hell, probably half of the world population lives under the dictates of a religion that says that women are held in such low esteem that they cannot be priests.

I don't know about you, but that felt pretty insulting to me... I could be wrong, for which you can call me an idiot, but it seemed pretty darn insulting to me...

[ulthakptah]

Didn't you read the article? It was a lighted box that displayed an OPEN BIBLE in it. As an endorsement to specific religions, it had NO PLACE in the auditorium of a public courthouse. Bravo for the lawsuit and bravo for the brave woman that brought the suit that had the Bible removed. Hopefully no one's made good on the death threats she received for her efforts.

Oh noes! an open bible in a display case! Really don't you think that's an over reaction? It was a memorial. I don't know who William Mosher is, other than the article saying he was a philanthropist, but since there is a bible in his display case I'm guessing he was religious. Should all memorials of religious do gooders be removed from other public places? What about a statue of Mother Teresa? Should that be removed just because she was a nun? Anyway who reads a book in a display case? you can't even turn the pages, you have to get close to the glass. The whole thing would be a lot of trouble just to read a book.


Also I'm going to try and nip this in the bud right now. Science and Religion is not an example of dichotomy. Religious people and understand and accept science and vice versa.

[Vekseid]

I have been presented with more evidence than I would care to talk about that Evolution is a hoax, a fraud, and the 'evidence' that has been presented for it has been time and time again been disproven by scientists in the field, ones that weren't being sponsored by people interested in them finding evidence that proves evolution.

No, you have not, and no such thing has occurred. Feel free to start a thread claiming such, but you have been presented with no evidence against evolution whatsoever. At best, someone lied to you. At worst, you paid someone for the privilege.

You're actually calling a large number of members of this forum - who have seen and done such research with our own eyes, frauds. And for what end? So more people can suffer and die each year?

These people work long hours, doing thankless tasks, for little net benefit to themselves, but provide you with serious tangible benefits, and for what? So you can spit in their face and call them frauds, repeating the lies of actual, convicted frauds such as Kent Hovind?

At some level, it reminds me of arguing with someone who claimed that quantum mechanics was bunk, over the Internet. It's not as patently hilarious to anyone who has a concept of how electronic transistors work, but at the same time, it's more insidious and horrifying. The damage Creationists do has a cost in human suffering and lives. I don't blame you for buying into it, but please take a step back and understand that scientists are not faceless inhuman entities.

They are people. Some of whom are here.

And they do work. Some of which has or may improve your life.

And you may never get a chance to thank them in person. They don't exactly work for pay.

However, as this isn't a Creationist vs. Evolutionist thread, and I would be more than happy to discuss this, in a manner in which religion is not involved (because, well, I am thinking that there is as little chance that you will be convinced that the Universe was created in six days as there is a chance of me believing in the Big Bang)... However, the point remaining is that I have seen, in current Textbooks, facts that have been very firmly disproved by the scientific world 50 years ago, and I don't like that my tax payer's dollars are going to spreading stuff like that. That being said, I agree firmly with you, and if you are paying towards the upkeep of something that you normally would have no business even looking at, then you have every right in the world to get the government on the case of said object, to, if not get rid of it, then at least make sure that you don't have to pay for it.

Usually this is stuff like where a given bone goes, or other data points. This is more an impact of the underfunding of educational programs, and the ridiculous lockdown that textbook publishers have on that market.

But again, feel free to start a thread if you take issue with a specific point.

I personally have no idea what you are talking about an expression of entropy, so that means that I am probably wrong, and you are right... however, looking over the everything, showing that everything has balance until man comes around and disrupts it, I find it rather hard to believe that all of this came together by chance, which was my point to begin with. I am not saying that you believe that, I am just saying that I do not.

I can't really address the latter. It's certainly unnecessary to invent a micromanaging God for the Universe, though.

Entropy is 'heat' after a fashion - not heat in the sense of something being hot versus cold, but rather in the sense of being energy that is so evenly dissipated that it cannot be harnessed. Thus when we speak of 'the heat death of the Universe', it's actually very cold. But it's cold everywhere. The stars have long since ceased to shine, and nothing remains but a cold, dead void, for all time.

A simple way to think of it is to take a pool, place a film separating it into two halves, and fill one side with dye. Here you have your highly ordered, original Universe. Remove the film (the 'Big Bang'), and all chaos breaks loose as the dye spreads to the entirety of the pool, creating many very artistic turbulent wisps as it does so.

You are one such wisp. Were you to somehow reverse the process, your order of perception, too, would reverse.

I hope that helps. : /

But I agree with Vodka. The Arguing over these subjects brings out the worst in any kind of person, including myself(I recall very vividly having made a  complete fool of myself not too long ago), and, while discussing these subjects over dinner, with a nice something to drink, is great! But actually forcing what you do and do not believe down someone's throat is bad business for all involved, and I apologize if I have ever seemed like doing this. However, scientific rights and wrongs are not beliefs, and I more than welcome being called a complete idiot if I have it all wrong.

I wouldn't call it forcing a belief so much as being actively antagonistic. It convinces no one.

[Serephino]

There's a Bible in most hotel rooms in the dresser.  Should someone sue over that too?  Oh noes, there's a holy book where someone can see it!  I wasn't aware that a book could force someone to read it.  Seriously... unless you're being tied down and preached at, getting up in arms over it is stupid, and this is coming from a non Christian.  It's Christmas, a national holiday.  Banks and the post office and stuff are closed.  Would you rather them be open because how dare a government run thing close down on a religious holiday?  There would be a lot of people really pissed at you for that.  It's annoying, yes, but people want to be with their families.  I get that.

I see this as about equal too giving yourself a heart attack because your burger didn't have the pickles arranged right.  No one is forced to stand there and stare at it.  Don't believe in God?  There is absolutely nothing stopping you from walking right past without looking.  I mean, you do have control over where your eyes go.  If you're driving past, your eyes should be on the road anyway.  I like looking at nice displays.  It's not my religion, but they do a good job sometimes.  It makes people happy, and doesn't hurt anyone more than they see it for a few seconds before looking away.     

[Vekseid]

Gideons International is where the Bible in every Hotel room thing comes from. Even ignoring that hotels are private enterprises.

[Slywyn]

I think I can see where they were coming from with taking down the bible in front of the courthouse. For one, it's a courthouse. That's a section of the state. For two, there was a bible very prominantly displayed within a lit box out front(from what I understand of it's placement) the courthouse. A bible is a section of the church. If the two are to be separated, you can't have that sort of thing.

I don't necessarily -agree- with it since it was a monument to someone who I imagine was a pretty decent human being, but I can understand it.

[ulthakptah]

I doubt they would be making such a fuss if it was a copy of the Iliad...

[Slywyn]

I doubt they would be making such a fuss if it was a copy of the Iliad...

Unless I'm missing something the Iliad isn't a religious book. It has gods in it but it isn't a holy text.

I could be wrong, but the Iliad I remember is just a story.

And it wasn't just some lady off the street, she was a representative(member?) Of a Separation of Church and State advocacy group. Or something along those lines

[Stattick]

Like I said, I am not saying that Creation is right, even if I believe so. I am just saying that Evolution has been pointed out to be wrong a lot. And I would very much like to discuss this with you in a civil manner, without need for insults, and the putting of words in my mouth, in a Thread marked for such a thing, in which you can properly bash me over the head with my ignorance.

Not in a scientifically valid manner it hasn't. Let's put it this way - getting a group of scientists to agree on something is damn hard. It's like trying to get a bunch of politicians to agree on something. Yet when you poll biologists and geologists, only 0.05% of them don't believe in evolution. That's like 150 scientists out of 300,000. To have that many scientists agreeing on something is staggering. I'm not sure that you'd get that high of a percentage on even the physical laws (among scientists that have a relevant specialty, like physics, relativity, quantum mechanics, etc).

And as for Atheism, I haven't seem them create anything either.

I wasn't talking about atheists. I was talking about scientists. Scientists have created nearly ALL of the technology in the last century. It created the monitor and keyboard I'm using, the internet, and the ability for us to have this conversation. Without science, I wouldn't have the capacity to talk to anyone outside of the town I live in, excepting of course what I sent through the mail. Without science, you and I, if we were to somehow get together to have this conversation and we didn't live in the same town, would have to send out carefully written letters to each other. Careful, because paper and ink cost a lot of money way back when. Postage too. And if we were really lucky, a post might arrive every two weeks because of the dedicated work of the Pony Express. Science is the only reason I'm alive today; I was born with bad tonsils and a propensity to get bronchitis. If it weren't for the antibiotics that science gave us, I probably wouldn't have lived to see my teenage years.

Again, let me stress this: Atheism ISN'T a religion. It isn't a cohesive philosophy. Hell, it isn't a philosophy at all. Religion is many things to many people. It involves a community, common rituals, a subculture, and usually faith and belief in a set of supernatural beliefs. All atheism is, is the lack of belief in God(s).

Also, it might interest you to know that I'm not an atheist. I lean that direction from time to time, but I do have a nebulous belief in the supernatural and the gods. My beliefs lie somewhere between Paganism, Hinduism, and Buddhism, with some skepticism thrown in for good measure. I'm the sort of guy that straddles the line between humanism and mysticism, applying one or the other as seems appropriate to a given situation. I tend to look at problems in light of both sets of eyes.

Whereas missionaries are all over the world, making it a better place by providing food, Medical expertise, and other such things to places that need it, whereas Christianity inspired men such as Mozart, Beethoven, and Michelangelo, I can't seem to recall one work of art inspired by Atheism. All I can recall is those guys sitting on their asses, laughing at how dumb Christians are. I am not saying that Christianity is the best. It also inspired such bad things as the massacres all over the Middle Ages, Crusades, and just about all the bad stuff in that time period. Science, however, hasn't done much better. It invented lots of bio-friendly crops. It has also developed  Biological weapons. It has also been responsible for good nuclear energy.  I could go on,, and on, and on about all the good and bad things that both religion and science have done for the world, but that would be beside the point. The point is that what the fuck are we fighting about? Nice, fun, healthy discussion is, as I said, fun. If you have to stoop to insulting merely because I am, in your eyes, misinformed, then, my friend, you should have a few history lessons about how good that went by in the past.

I never said that religion didn't do any good in the world. Only that they hadn't invented any technology. I may not have been clear enough when I said that, so that's my bad.

I don't know about you, but that felt pretty insulting to me... I could be wrong, for which you can call me an idiot, but it seemed pretty darn insulting to me...

I didn't intend to insult you. I can see how you could read it that way though. I'm sorry. I should have been more clear.

[ulthakptah]

Unless I'm missing something the Iliad isn't a religious book. It has gods in it but it isn't a holy text.

I could be wrong, but the Iliad I remember is just a story.

And it wasn't just some lady off the street, she was a representative(member?) Of a Separation of Church and State advocacy group. Or something along those lines

I would consider Hellenic Polytheist a religion, and while you may think of it as just a story I would imagine that many ancient Greeks considered its events to be fact. There might even be some today, but I don't really know a way to confirm that.

[Oniya]

Well, Schlieman's archeological discovery of Troy was led primarily by his belief that the Homeric epics were based at least in geographical fact.

[Slywyn]

Stories can be factual.

That doesn't change it from being just a story though. A story about something that may or may not have happened involving some gods that may or may not exist, but a story nonetheless.

It's not a religious codex used in churches/synegogues/mosques/temples/etc.

[ulthakptah]

It was written down and read aloud when they were holding festivals to honor their gods. How is that not a religious codex?

Anyway, isn't the bible a collection of stories that may or may not have happened involving a god that may or may not exist?

[Stattick]

Oh noes! an open bible in a display case!

Exactly.

Really don't you think that's an over reaction?

Nope.

"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between Church & State." Thomas Jefferson, on the First Amendment.

By the way, the Supreme Court of the United States of America has repeatedly referred back to the above quote as authoritative in regards to what the intent of the Founding Fathers was. Their direct words, in reference to Jefferson's quote: "...coming as this does from an acknowledged leader of the advocates of the measure, it may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the amendment thus secured."

In Everson v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court had this to say:  "The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach."

In Lemon v. Kurtzman, the Supreme Court established the Lemon Test, with regards to whether something violated the separation of church and state: First, the law or policy must have been adopted with a neutral or non-religious purpose. Second, the principle or primary effect must be one that neither advances nor inhibits religion. Third, the statute or policy must not result in an "excessive entanglement" of government with religion.

Now, consider the Bible in the Court house case. Was the Bible there because of a neutral or non-religious purpose? Not likely. Courts have Bibles in them, so people can be sworn in. But the courts don't put those Bibles in big, showy monuments. Did the principle or primary effect advance or inhibit religion? Yes, it did. It advanced Christianity, and by extension, inhibited other religions. It implied that Christianity was more important to that court than any other religion. Lastly, did this result in excessive entanglement of government with religion. That could be argued pro or con. Personally, I'd argue no, because it didn't involve the court directly in any particular religion, but it could be argued that it showed a pro-Christian bias. At any rate, this particular case pretty clearly fails the Lemon Test.

Back to the original topic of this thread, the city of Santa Barbara also clearly failed the Lemon Test originally by allowing a manger scene to be displayed in the public park at the exclusion to any other religions being represented. However, once taken to task for that, the city quickly allowed others to put up displays, so it could be fair. The city itself wasn't paying for these religious displays, but simply allowing them to be put up. And finally, when vandalism and ugliness surrounded the whole thing, the city took away the privilege for groups to put up displays. Then some church groups tried to sue the city, but fortunately, that was summarily tossed out of court.

And yeah, for those that have said so, I agree, the atheist groups were kind of being dicks about the whole thing. But still, it was a better way for them to go about the legal question, rather than suing the city and getting the ACLU involved.

[Stattick]

I would consider Hellenic Polytheist a religion, and while you may think of it as just a story I would imagine that many ancient Greeks considered its events to be fact. There might even be some today, but I don't really know a way to confirm that.

If it's important to you, and you think you have a case, then you should contact the ACLU. They love cases like that. Seriously.

http://www.aclu.org/contact-us

[ulthakptah]

If it's important to you, and you think you have a case, then you should contact the ACLU. They love cases like that. Seriously.

http://www.aclu.org/contact-us

The thing is I don't care if a copy of the Iliad is on display in a public place. I wouldn't care if it was a Koran or Torah was on display. This isn't about legislature. No laws are going into place. This is just people picking fancy nick knacks to put up as decorations. And that the nick knacks with religious meaning to them are banned from being in a public building is ludicrous.

[Stattick]

The thing is I don't care if a copy of the Iliad is on display in a public place. I wouldn't care if it was a Koran or Torah was on display. This isn't about legislature. No laws are going into place. This is just people picking fancy nick knacks to put up as decorations. And that the nick knacks with religious meaning to them are banned from being in a public building is ludicrous.

Well, it's the law of the land here in the US. Maybe you'd get along better if you moved to the UK? They're more accepting of having religious stuff in their courthouses and parks. Hell, they've got a state religion and everything. It even comes in two flavors: High Church for that Catholic feel, and Low Church for that Protestant feel. Hmm.... makes me wonder, with it being a State religion and all... Are the priests' salaries paid by the government, and therefore taken out of the tax revenue?

[LunarSage]

I don't believe there are any official groups in the US actively worshiping the ancient Greek gods and avoiding paying taxes because of it.  That's the difference, I think.

[Slywyn]

I don't believe there are any official groups in the US actively worshiping the ancient Greek gods and avoiding paying taxes because of it.  That's the difference, I think.

That's kinda what I was trying to get at. I'm pretty sure that there's some obscure religion somewhere that worships superman comics.

That doesn't mean they create a separation of church and state issue, because to 99% of the population, they're just comic books.

To 99% of the population a holy bible is a religious text, and it becomes a problem.

[ulthakptah]

Well, it's the law of the land here in the US. Maybe you'd get along better if you moved to the UK? They're more accepting of having religious stuff in their courthouses and parks. Hell, they've got a state religion and everything. It even comes in two flavors: High Church for that Catholic feel, and Low Church for that Protestant feel. Hmm.... makes me wonder, with it being a State religion and all... Are the priests' salaries paid by the government, and therefore taken out of the tax revenue?

Maybe instead I'll just start a cult that worships vending machines. With enough luck maybe it will get so popular people will start banning vending machines from public places.

[Stattick]

Maybe instead I'll just start a cult that worships vending machines. With enough luck maybe it will get so popular people will start banning vending machines from public places.

Yeah, because taking the access to food and beverages out of courtrooms isn't small minded, petty, or mean. Is that your disconnect? Do you think that people are asking to have other people's religions taken out of public places just because they're small minded, petty, and mean? Do you really not understand that to some of us, running across that sort of thing is like a slap in the face? Do you truly not understand that some of us have had horrible, scaring experiences with Christian religion, and want it kept the fuck out of the public places our taxes pay for, which happens to coincide with the separation of church and state?

[Beguile's Mistress]

When we all stop being offended by what another person decides about the existence of a higher power in what ever form your culture, etc., decides to worship or when a person decides there is no higher power to subscribe to we will all be better off.  I don't care if you are an atheist, Christian, Catholic, Jew, Mormon, Jehovah's Witness, Pagan or any other sect/religion/faith you can name.  I never did care and I hope I never start caring. 

Religion does not abuse people.  People abuse religion.
Faith is not about people.  Faith is about belief in God (for want of any other word).

Faith and religion are constructs not individuals.  Individuals, i.e. people, commit the crimes, insult others, preach hate and make this world a sad place to live in at times.  People can be arrogant and that arrogance gives them the self-proclaimed power to speak for others, God included, and decide for everyone what is right.  The only person who has that right to decide for you is you and the only person you may chose for is yourself.

We all live in this world and we all need to get along and acknowledge the rights of others whether we like them or not.  Someone wise once told me that if there is the chance something you might do will hurt someone don't do it even if they've hurt you in the past. 

[Callie Del Noire]

Yeah, because taking the access to food and beverages out of courtrooms isn't small minded, petty, or mean. Is that your disconnect? Do you think that people are asking to have other people's religions taken out of public places just because they're small minded, petty, and mean? Do you really not understand that to some of us, running across that sort of thing is like a slap in the face? Do you truly not understand that some of us have had horrible, scaring experiences with Christian religion, and want it kept the fuck out of the public places our taxes pay for, which happens to coincide with the separation of church and state?

And what scarring/traumatizing/evil act did the person whose memorial that was do to you?  It was petty and low spirited to go after it and use the pretext of separation of church and state. A LOT of people need to get over themselves and stop looking for reasons to hurt one another.

In the case of the OP, yeah I think that city did the right thing. The CITY showed the maturity and practical sense to end the issue. In the case of the memorial, I see a bit of pettiness dressed up in moral outrage.

My brother, who is fairly well off, donates a building or something else to the community and puts up a placard with a suitable, but religious quote, on it. Does that merit years from now pulling the city into court to pull down the placard because it offends some atheist that someone uses god in justifying their charity?

Why are we SO intent on destroying the good actions of the faithful? Aren't there enough reasons to argue, bicker, demean and degrade one another without looking for more? Take it in the positive spirit it was intended rather than look for reasons to HATE it.

Too any folks on BOTH sides of this ort of issue are looking for reasons to feel hurt and to hurt the other side.

[Serephino]

And what scarring/traumatizing/evil act did the person whose memorial that was do to you?  It was petty and low spirited to go after it and use the pretext of separation of church and state. A LOT of people need to get over themselves and stop looking for reasons to hurt one another.

In the case of the OP, yeah I think that city did the right thing. The CITY showed the maturity and practical sense to end the issue. In the case of the memorial, I see a bit of pettiness dressed up in moral outrage.

My brother, who is fairly well off, donates a building or something else to the community and puts up a placard with a suitable, but religious quote, on it. Does that merit years from now pulling the city into court to pull down the placard because it offends some atheist that someone uses god in justifying their charity?

Why are we SO intent on destroying the good actions of the faithful? Aren't there enough reasons to argue, bicker, demean and degrade one another without looking for more? Take it in the positive spirit it was intended rather than look for reasons to HATE it.

Too any folks on BOTH sides of this ort of issue are looking for reasons to feel hurt and to hurt the other side.

+1

[Sabby]

r/atheism

Because Athiests can be dicks to x3

[Braioch]

And what scarring/traumatizing/evil act did the person whose memorial that was do to you?  It was petty and low spirited to go after it and use the pretext of separation of church and state. A LOT of people need to get over themselves and stop looking for reasons to hurt one another.

In the case of the OP, yeah I think that city did the right thing. The CITY showed the maturity and practical sense to end the issue. In the case of the memorial, I see a bit of pettiness dressed up in moral outrage.

My brother, who is fairly well off, donates a building or something else to the community and puts up a placard with a suitable, but religious quote, on it. Does that merit years from now pulling the city into court to pull down the placard because it offends some atheist that someone uses god in justifying their charity?

If they did it for petty reasons, then yes, I would wholeheartedly disagree with it. Nevertheless, were that it wasn't, then I would support the removal of anything religiously based in a government funded place. Especially somewhere where there are laws, supposed secular laws, that are supposed to be being upheld.

As for the placard, you make it sound like it's a privately owned building, so no. Anyone whining about it might as well not go there, as it's not public/government owned/managed.

Why are we SO intent on destroying the good actions of the faithful? Aren't there enough reasons to argue, bicker, demean and degrade one another without looking for more? Take it in the positive spirit it was intended rather than look for reasons to HATE it.

Too any folks on BOTH sides of this ort of issue are looking for reasons to feel hurt and to hurt the other side.

Who is we?

Anyways, people are not intent on destroying the good actions of the faithful, at least people who aren't truly dicks. People like myself and other more reasonable people are more of the mind that we see a lot more harm that comes about than good. Also, I have a hard time with sainthood all things consider, look at Mother Theresea after all, she had some rather not so nice policies and behaviors. Not that she didn't do good, but it's discomforting to try to venerate her as this amazing, perfect, saint when reality lacks such a black and white aspect to it. Back onto what I was saying, don't mistake pointing out the bad that is very often ignored for trying to destroy the bad.

As a note, (not aimed at any specific person) stop clustering all atheists and nontheists together. The only similar trait they share is that ONE facet, otherwise we are as varied in our viewpoints and personalities as it can generally be. Except for the whole agreeing on scientific fact thing, because science kicks ass.

[vtboy]

When we all stop being offended by what another person decides about the existence of a higher power in what ever form your culture, etc., decides to worship or when a person decides there is no higher power to subscribe to we will all be better off.  I don't care if you are an atheist, Christian, Catholic, Jew, Mormon, Jehovah's Witness, Pagan or any other sect/religion/faith you can name.  I never did care and I hope I never start caring. 

Religion does not abuse people.  People abuse religion.
Faith is not about people.  Faith is about belief in God (for want of any other word).

Faith and religion are constructs not individuals.  Individuals, i.e. people, commit the crimes, insult others, preach hate and make this world a sad place to live in at times.  People can be arrogant and that arrogance gives them the self-proclaimed power to speak for others, God included, and decide for everyone what is right.  The only person who has that right to decide for you is you and the only person you may chose for is yourself.

The reason I am offended by religious displays on public property is not that I give a hoot about the beliefs of the people who put them up; it is because, in a pluralistic and secular democracy, such displays do not belong on public property.

I do not object to religious symbols on churches, synagogues and mosques, on my neighbors' homes (as long as the flood lights do not keep me up at night), or on any other private property. But, when it comes to courthouses, city halls, public schools, post offices, public parks, and all the other real estate collectively owned by the citizenry, there is simply no justification for any government in this country ever to erect any sort of display suggesting it favors any particular viewpoint on religion over any other.  And, when some political subdivision inscribes scripture of any sort over the doors of its courthouse, or paints a mural of Abraham offering to sacrifice Isaac on the wall of a juvenile detention center, or begins the school day with excerpts from the Sermon on the Mount or from Sha'ria, it is doing just that -- endorsing some species of religious belief.

Implicit in your statements that "religion does not abuse people" and "people abuse religion" is the notion that evil done in the name of religion is not a consequence of religion's teachings but of some corrupt human understanding of those teachings. If only the matter were that clear. Scripture tends to be cryptic and full of self-contradiction. Like tea leaves, its reading tends more to reflect the sensibilities and prejudices of the reader than of the author. Those who are inclined to find a benificent message from a loving god frequently focus on scripture's lovey-dovey stuff, but elide a lot of its nastier passages, such as those which require the stoning of adulterers and masturbators, or those which condone human slavery (regrettably, in the conventional rather than the sexual sense).

I know that our secular laws prohibit the killing of abortion doctors. I have no idea whether the laws attributed to god do.     

[Callie Del Noire]

I know that our secular laws prohibit the killing of abortion doctors. I have no idea whether the laws attributed to god do.     

I would think it is pretty easily summed up in one of those 'needless bits of religous fippery' you seem to dislike. A list of 10 mandates.. you know the one that says simply.. 'Thou shalt not kill'.

[vtboy]

I would think it is pretty easily summed up in one of those 'needless bits of religous fippery' you seem to dislike. A list of 10 mandates.. you know the one that says simply.. 'Thou shalt not kill'.

Here we are reading tea leaves again.

Thou shalt not kill.

The statement is unqualified. Does it apply to the killing of animals, or just to the killing of humans?

Does it prohibit killing in self defense? Though I suspect most people would say "no," nothing in the commandment suggests homicide is ever justifiable.

Does it proscribe the waging of war? Military chaplains apparently think not, at least when it comes to the side whose uniform they wear. Nor, apparently, have the clerics and true believers who instigated and fought the many religious wars throughout history thought so. Is the answer different for the winners than it is for the losers? After all, if one believes in an interventionist god, one might infer from victory an endorsement of the victors' ends and means.

How about assisted suicide of the terminally ill? Many think it an obvious transgression. Others believe there is a moral obligation to assist those in or approaching extremis to avoid pointless suffering, and an exemption from the proscription for such acts.

What about capital punishment? Within the prohibition, or without? Many clerics have endorsed its application, and often in service of their own religious institutions.

Abortion doctors? I suspect that at least some who have killed abortionists believed they enjoyed a pass on the commandment, as their acts prevented the taking of many more innocent lives and, thus, were true to the commandment's purpose. 

On top of all this, there is some controversy as to whether the correct translation of the commandment from Hebrew is "thou shall not kill" or "thou shall not murder," the latter being a legalistic concept.

Here is some of what Lincoln thought about the simplicity of divining the will of the divine:

"Both [sides in the Civil War] read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged."

Perhaps, moral guidance is not quite as apparent in scripture, even in the commandment against killing, as you suggest.

[Callie Del Noire]

Correct me if I'm wrong but there are copious examples of laws against murder in all it's varieties, levels and incarnations on the books. They don't guide those misguided individuals anymore than the three words I cited earlier.

So please stop taking outrage on what a small percentage does on the rest of the group that believes. Moral distinctions and decisions in the end come down to the individual. Too few folks these days look at thinking for themselves..

Religion.. like guns.. don't kill people. We do, using one as a tool to do it and the other as a justification. And there are plenty of both justification and tools to do it with.

I'm just pointing out you come down pretty hard on religion as a whole rather than trying to look into how it, like anything else, is subverted for those who give lip service to it rather than follow the spirit of the idea.

I'm done. I shan't be reading/posting in here anymore I think.

[TheGlyphstone]

Just to point out that the actual Commandment is 'Thou Shall Not Murder', not 'Thou Shall Not Kill'. Now, that requires you to pin down if a death is murder or not, but it's better - if more vague - than a flat ban on killing.

[KennethNoisewater]

And what scarring/traumatizing/evil act did the person whose memorial that was do to you?  It was petty and low spirited to go after it and use the pretext of separation of church and state. A LOT of people need to get over themselves and stop looking for reasons to hurt one another.

In the case of the OP, yeah I think that city did the right thing. The CITY showed the maturity and practical sense to end the issue. In the case of the memorial, I see a bit of pettiness dressed up in moral outrage.

My brother, who is fairly well off, donates a building or something else to the community and puts up a placard with a suitable, but religious quote, on it. Does that merit years from now pulling the city into court to pull down the placard because it offends some atheist that someone uses god in justifying their charity?

Why are we SO intent on destroying the good actions of the faithful? Aren't there enough reasons to argue, bicker, demean and degrade one another without looking for more? Take it in the positive spirit it was intended rather than look for reasons to HATE it.

Too any folks on BOTH sides of this ort of issue are looking for reasons to feel hurt and to hurt the other side.

I think the real issue is the citing of your brother (or anyone for that mattering) donating anything within a religious context.  Why can it not be done out of the goodness of one's heart?  Why does it have to be tied to the stipulation that it was motivated in part or whole by religion?  Why is it that we have an entire society that does not do good things because they should be done, but because they are attempting to punch a ticket to heaven?  It is not about destroying the actions of the faithful, it is questioning why these actions even need faith attached to them in the first place.

A faith which, is becoming majority belief, criticizes and looks down upon entire groups of our population based off a passage in a book (homosexuality).  But in that same book they turn their cheek the other way when it talks of gang rapes, incest, slavery, mistreatment of women, and on and on.  Yet they choose to pull this one element and say it is the word of god.  Morality and laws did not derive from the bible.  We create morality and laws.  This is exhibited by the fact that so many pick and choose what they want to believe as morality from the books, therefore creating their own parameters of morality.  They will choose to frown upon homosexuality and adultery, but when was the last time you heard a religious person get up and decry the other actions and ideas that are condoned in the bible?

[Oniya]

I wouldn't say that the donation would have to be in a 'religious context' to incorporate a Bible verse.  I can think of quite a few that would make the average person blush.  Songs 4:5 would be appropriate at a women's clinic, perhaps...

[vtboy]

Correct me if I'm wrong but there are copious examples of laws against murder in all it's varieties, levels and incarnations on the books. They don't guide those misguided individuals anymore than the three words I cited earlier.

No, you are not wrong in this. You are just missing the point.

Homicide is rarely the result of vagary in our homicide laws. Occasionally, as in the case of the Treyvon Martin shooting, it may be unclear just how the law should apply in a particular circumstance, but this tends to be the exception rather than the rule. I suspect that most murderers, when they commit murder, realize they are violating man's law.

This stands in contrast to the examples I've provided in which it is not always clear whether the killing violates laws attributed to god. Reasonable people of good faith may come to very different conclusions as to whether, for example, doctor assisted suicide or killing in combat or judicial execution or even the killing of an abortion doctor violates the commandment. In each case, though, I think whether or not the act violates secular law is clear.

It is also worth noting that the bible prescribes death for a variety of acts many moralists no longer consider quite so grave as to warrant the punishment, including adultery, false prophecy, blasphemy, and breaking the Sabbath.

Thus, when someone says, in effect, "god has provided perfect moral guidance through religion and it is only man, in his corruption and feebleness, who has fucked it up," too much credit is given to god, and not enough to man. Or, perhaps, too much blame is assigned man, and not enough to god.

So please stop taking outrage on what a small percentage does on the rest of the group that believes.

I don't presume to tell you what to be outraged over. Please return the courtesy.

That I blame "what a small percentage does on the rest of the group that believes" is a canard which I would have thought beneath you. While I believe religion has in one way or another caused or contributed to a great deal of human suffering, I can't imagine where you got the idea that I blame all members of any religious group for the bad acts of a few of its members, in the absence of endorsement of those acts. I have never, for example, blamed all Christians (not even all fundamentalist Christians) for murders of abortion doctors committed in the name of Christ. I am likewise certain that many Catholics are critical of the benighted dogma of their religion regarding homosexuality.

Moral distinctions and decisions in the end come down to the individual. Too few folks these days look at thinking for themselves..

I agree with the latter point. I am not sure what you mean by the former.

Please allow me to remind you of what I said in an earlier post in this thread about those who claim religious justification for their acts: "Scripture tends to be cryptic and full of self-contradiction. Like tea leaves, its reading tends more to reflect the sensibilities and prejudices of the reader than of the author." It seems you agree with this.

Religion.. like guns.. don't kill people. We do, using one as a tool to do it and the other as a justification. And there are plenty of both justification and tools to do it with.

Religion has frequently provided a ready source of justification to those who would commit barbarous acts. Today's conventional wisdom is that those who found warrant in the bible for launching wars or stoning adulterers or burning witches or flying airplanes into office buildings got its message wrong. The view is comforting to those who like the syrupy view of god and religion, but where, really, is its touchstone?

I don't know that it profits us to distinguish between the role of religion and the role of people in killing or other nastiness, especially for those who believe, as I do, that religion is the handiwork of man. We regulate guns (to the extent we regulate them) in the hope that by so doing we will reduce the number of instances in which people will use them to commit homicide. We regulate religion -- to the extent only of separating it from government and insisting on the primacy of secular laws -- in the hope that we will reduce the number of instances in which people will use it to oppress and harm others. The point here is that both guns and religion are too dangerous to be left entirely unregulated.

I'm just pointing out you come down pretty hard on religion as a whole rather than trying to look into how it, like anything else, is subverted for those who give lip service to it rather than follow the spirit of the idea.

Your insistence that the failings of religion lie only in its being "subverted" by those who refuse to "follow the spirit of the idea" only begs the question of what, exactly, is "the spirit of the idea?" As I've tried to point out, the expression of the "idea" has been more than a little bit muddy.

I'm done. I shan't be reading/posting in here anymore I think.

Your call, of course.

[Braioch]

I take issue with people stating that the bible is being interpreted incorrectly at times. Because I'm sorry, it is more than obvious about what you are supposed to do at times, and few of them are nice. (NOT EVEN going to go into the steady stream of contradictions and back pedaling that it does on a frequent basis either) Sorry, the way I look at it, the horrible, terrible rules that everyone likes to conveniently ignore is exactly what you're supposed to do in those cases. If you want to take what you feel to be the intended message of love and what have you, then fine, but it doesn't sit well with me when you have a book that tells you to murder over the smallest infraction. The justifications of religion (currently referring strictly to the Judeo Christian ones) for carnage, enslavement, murder and genocide are not corruption of the book, but following the damn instruction manual.

I need to find that quote about people whom would follow the old versus the new testament...

Please hold

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AH!

Here it is, good ole google, and found a few interesting sites and an interesting list of quotes about religion and such, anyways, this is the quote I mean:

"If a man would follow, today, the teachings of the Old Testament, he would be a criminal. If he would follow strictly the teachings of the New, he would be insane."
-Robert Ingersoll

Even with people backing out of saying they don't follow the Old Testament, or they don't have too, it still stands that it's kind of part of your holy book, part of the codified laws in which one would have to follow. Even the new stuff is wildly contradictory and self-defeating, stuff that I am utterly bewildered that people would stand by with the ferocity that they do. I do not take issue with Faith, with belief, (or as said in Dogma, "having an idea.") But to create religion? Something that has time and time again in history damaged humanity and it's progress time and time again? I just cannot fathom it at all.

Y'all got me on that one.

[Sho]

faith which, is becoming majority belief, criticizes and looks down upon entire groups of our population based off a passage in a book (homosexuality).  But in that same book they turn their cheek the other way when it talks of gang rapes, incest, slavery, mistreatment of women, and on and on...[sic]They will choose to frown upon homosexuality and adultery, but when was the last time you heard a religious person get up and decry the other actions and ideas that are condoned in the bible?

Not to nit-pick, but often, actually. I've never heard someone who wasn't a zealot agree with anything that you've mentioned listed - and actually, there are a fair number of Christians who see nothing wrong with homosexuality. It's just a case of the most obnoxious, loud, bigoted Christians being heard over the reasonable ones. It's actually rather insulting to have someone lump all Christians into one bigoted, hateful group that are supposedly close-minded and unaccepting of all groups of people except themselves. Frankly, it's not true - and as much as people say atheists are nowhere near as harmful or mean as the big, bad Christians, it's attitudes like that above which can be just as hurtful. In the same way most atheists don't like to be condemned for their beliefs, we Christians would prefer not to be as well. Just keep it in mind, please.

I take issue with people stating that the bible is being interpreted incorrectly at times...[sic] Sorry, the way I look at it, the horrible, terrible rules that everyone likes to conveniently ignore is exactly what you're supposed to do in those cases. Even with people backing out of saying they don't follow the Old Testament, or they don't have too, it still stands that it's kind of part of your holy book, part of the codified laws in which one would have to follow. Even the new stuff is wildly contradictory and self-defeating, stuff that I am utterly bewildered that people would stand by with the ferocity that they do. I do not take issue with Faith, with belief, (or as said in Dogma, "having an idea.") But to create religion? Something that has time and time again in history damaged humanity and it's progress time and time again? I just cannot fathom it at all.

Aaaaaalrighty. Again, the whole Christian-bashing thing is a little bit tired. But. There are plenty of churches that do not follow the Bible strictly - in fact, in my experience, the majority of churches use the good parts of the Bible as a social code and the bad past as, well, outdated book markers. In the same way that you read a book about, let's say, the Vikings, you wouldn't question women being carried away and raped (not to say that it's not bad, but that it was simply part of the social structure at the time), many Christians are reasonable enough to understand that the Bible is, at best, a very outdated book. That being said, a huge portion of Christians are quite reasonable - we just find that it's generally not worth our time to butt heads because inevitably we end up being painted as evil for supporting a system that is supposedly entirely bad and morally reprehensible.

A little more on topic - I can understand why the city made their decision, and I respect it. It was what they had to do and what was most reasonable - but I can't help but feel that the fact that people would petition the Nativity scene is a bit...small. I understand that it's religious, but frankly, it's also usually just a scene with lights and bright colors. It's a pretty little distraction walking through a park - and I fail to see the similarity between a scene that is meant to inspire feelings of warmth and thanks in our hearts and a billboard meant to criticize and knock-down religion. While they have the right, it just seems to be so far from the spirit of what Christmas is supposed to be (and I mean that in the secular, warm, giving sense, not the Christian sense).

[KennethNoisewater]

"Not to nit-pick, but often, actually. I've never heard someone who wasn't a zealot agree with anything that you've mentioned listed - and actually, there are a fair number of Christians who see nothing wrong with homosexuality. It's just a case of the most obnoxious, loud, bigoted Christians being heard over the reasonable ones. It's actually rather insulting to have someone lump all Christians into one bigoted, hateful group that are supposedly close-minded and unaccepting of all groups of people except themselves. Frankly, it's not true - and as much as people say atheists are nowhere near as harmful or mean as the big, bad Christians, it's attitudes like that above which can be just as hurtful. In the same way most atheists don't like to be condemned for their beliefs, we Christians would prefer not to be as well. Just keep it in mind, please."

And there in lies the issue.  You are right, there are a very large percentage of Christians that take no issue with homosexuality.  But they do not speak against that oh so sacred book and those groups that do take issue.  Instead they sit in the corner and remain silent.  Sure there are a handful of them that will stand alongside those that are gay and defend them.  But it is few and far between.  But as I said, the majority will sit in the corner and say nothing.  And saying nothing is just as bad as supporting it.  They still read the "good book" knowing that the bad, wrong, evil, and immoral message is just as prevalent in it as the good.  So rather than putting it aside and being good just for the sake of being good, they still choose to stand shoulder to shoulder with those that are the loudest and the biggest bigots they can find all in the hopes that they can punch that shiny gold ticket to heaven.  And that is a selfish motive, and if I am not mistaken, selfish is looked down upon in the bible.  Yet the entire premise of the religious culture is selfish.  No one associated with the church can do good just to do good.  They have to attach religion to it, make sure that everyone knows that religion is attached to it, and hope that it wins some sort of universal approval because of it.

But your statement of the majority not taking issue is incorrect.  If that were the case we wouldn't see these ballot measures to provide equal rights and marriage fail so miserably.  Because if a majority of the Christians out there didn't believe the same as those loud mouthed "minorities" then they would get out and show their solidarity with the the rest of the non-bigots and help pass a ballot for those that are gay.  You can't choose a religion and then cherry pick what you want to believe in from it.  It completely defeats the entire premise behind religion.  That it guides and creates morality, that it promotes and guides what is good.  Yet each individual who decides to the dissect the bible and take what they wish from it is already establishing their own case of morality and good, independent of what that antiquated, racists, sexist, historically inaccurate, brain washing, war starting, culture dividing, bigoted book.

[Sho]

But they do not speak against that oh so sacred book and those groups that do take issue.  Instead they sit in the corner and remain silent.  Sure there are a handful of them that will stand alongside those that are gay and defend them.  But it is few and far between.  But as I said, the majority will sit in the corner and say nothing.  And saying nothing is just as bad as supporting it.  They still read the "good book" knowing that the bad, wrong, evil, and immoral message is just as prevalent in it as the good.  So rather than putting it aside and being good just for the sake of being good, they still choose to stand shoulder to shoulder with those that are the loudest and the biggest bigots they can find all in the hopes that they can punch that shiny gold ticket to heaven. 

Well, it's fairly clear to me that I'm not going to change your mind, if you assume that because we're quiet, all Christians align themselves with hateful groups that claim to be Christian (a la Westboro Baptist Church). Is a Christian who doesn't march in a gay pride rally any less of a good person than a regular person who doesn't do it? There are plenty of people who whole-heartedly support gay rights but don't march in rallies, don't drive hours out of their way to get into debates, don't want to waste their time puffing hot air at the zealot Christians who obviously are not going to change their minds. It doesn't mean that we don't support those rights, and in fact, we will vote for them and encourage our friends to do so as well. It just means that, to a certain extent, those bigoted Christians are a lost cause that unfortunately have been taken to represent the whole, and we're so tired of trying to deal with them that we've stepped back.

Take, for example, the Republicans. The Tea Party has come to be a universal representative of the party (at least in popular opinion), but there are quite a few reasonable Republicans. They're just drowned out by the angry, screaming mob. They try to make their point heard but eventually give up.

In short, I guess what I'm saying, is that those rational Christians don't want to stick their necks out because the zealots will try to knock them down, as will heavily opinionated non-religious folks. Either they're bad people because they're Christian, period, or they're bad because they're not Christian enough. You hit a point where if everyone is going to hate you, it's just easier to stick to your enclave.

As far as the Bible being horribly immoral - yeah, parts of it are bad. I'm not even going to try to argue that fact. Anyone shoving the Bible down someone else's throat is doing a terrible job of being a Christian. To condemn an entire book as being unworthy or as burnable, though, because of it containing some things you object to, is...odd. It brings to mind the groups that try to ban books because of sexual content, violent content, or because the book contains a message that they don't agree with. As far as I see it (and this is solely my opinion and I wouldn't claim to speak for all Christians, particularly on this point), it's a wonderful book for literary purposes, since much of Western canon literature draws on Biblical references. Beyond that, it's a slightly outdated social code that can have some nice tips, but that's about the extent of it.

Steering more firmly back onto the topic, though (I'll try not to harp on the whole Christian-bashing bit since it's counterproductive, and I don't want things to get heated or personal)...the city did the right thing, legislatively speaking. I can't help but be sad, though, that groups felt it necessary to take down something that has quite a warm message. Even if one disagrees with the religious aspect, the overall message is one of hope, and love, and peace. It's about wondrement, and the celebration of new life and old, and of the humblest beginnings giving birth to greatness. It's about reminding us to give thanks for what we do have, even if we're in what seem like dirty, humble surroundings. It's about the appreciation of the world around us and the daily gifts that we're given. I just find it unfortunate that that message isn't appreciated and instead it's villified as a Christian, hateful scene meant to psychologically torment people.

[Torch]

In short, I guess what I'm saying, is that those rational Christians don't want to stick their necks out because the zealots will try to knock them down, as will heavily opinionated non-religious folks.

Or a more likely answer is that some folks still adhere to the notion that their faith and religious beliefs are very personal and private, and not meant for public discourse.

[Braioch]

Bashing?

No, that's taking notice of something and calling it out.

As for calling out Christianity, I hear the argument all the time. "Why do you have to pick on Christianity so much?" For the same reason that so many people become Christian rather than Taoist or Muslim around here. I live in the US, just take a look at the percentage of Christians in this country and you'll see how often I run into Christianity and it's bizarre beliefs everyday. I'm not being a bully, I'm not picking on one because it's the easiest to beat up on, or because I like tormenting and taunting Christians. I do it because this is the religion I have to deal with everyday, with it's beliefs, the habits of it's followers, every destructive (for oneself and others) and head scratching behavior.

Side note: The bible doesn't like much of anyone unless you're a white, heterosexual male for the most part and even then it's not all that guaranteed. So no, I wasn't just addressing homosexuality, don't assume that's what I meant. (In reference to your parenthesis addition to my post)

As for not lumping them altogether and not all thinking the way the bible tells them, I don't and I'm sure they don't. And yet those that would think contrary still sit idly by while their more oppressive and aggressive co-members bowl over people and shout hate from the rooftops. If you're quiet, than I have no choice but to think that you either support the hate, or perfectly content to let it happen without a peep. Which happens all to often, as it's said, evil happens when good people let the bad things happen (paraphrase) and I'm not going to look kindly on the silent or the verbal hate spewers.

[Caela]

Bashing?

No, that's taking notice of something and calling it out.

As for calling out Christianity, I hear the argument all the time. "Why do you have to pick on Christianity so much?" For the same reason that so many people become Christian rather than Taoist or Muslim around here. I live in the US, just take a look at the percentage of Christians in this country and you'll see how often I run into Christianity and it's bizarre beliefs everyday. I'm not being a bully, I'm not picking on one because it's the easiest to beat up on, or because I like tormenting and taunting Christians. I do it because this is the religion I have to deal with everyday, with it's beliefs, the habits of it's followers, every destructive (for oneself and others) and head scratching behavior.

Side note: The bible doesn't like much of anyone unless you're a white, heterosexual male for the most part and even then it's not all that guaranteed. So no, I wasn't just addressing homosexuality, don't assume that's what I meant. (In reference to your parenthesis addition to my post)

As for not lumping them altogether and not all thinking the way the bible tells them, I don't and I'm sure they don't. And yet those that would think contrary still sit idly by while their more oppressive and aggressive co-members bowl over people and shout hate from the rooftops. If you're quiet, than I have no choice but to think that you either support the hate, or perfectly content to let it happen without a peep. Which happens all to often, as it's said, evil happens when good people let the bad things happen (paraphrase) and I'm not going to look kindly on the silent or the verbal hate spewers.

Bolded the part that stuck in my head....actually the Bible (Particularly the Old Testament!) doesn't like much of anyone who isn't a Jewish heterosexual male. The whole Old Testament is actually meant to be a covenant between the tribes of Israel and God...anyone else need not apply.

It isn't until Christ's death and Resurrection in the New Testament that Gentiles (everyone not Jewish) is given a path to God. So in actuality, anyone calling themselves Christian, should note the Old Testament simply as a, "The is where we came from" but not as a religious text because the only part of that book that is actually supposed to apply to them is the New Testament.

[Braioch]

Bolded the part that stuck in my head....actually the Bible (Particularly the Old Testament!) doesn't like much of anyone who isn't a Jewish heterosexual male. The whole Old Testament is actually meant to be a covenant between the tribes of Israel and God...anyone else need not apply.

It isn't until Christ's death and Resurrection in the New Testament that Gentiles (everyone not Jewish) is given a path to God. So in actuality, anyone calling themselves Christian, should note the Old Testament simply as a, "The is where we came from" but not as a religious text because the only part of that book that is actually supposed to apply to them is the New Testament.

As for the first paragraph, touche and I concede to your point, your very accurate point. :P

As to the second, it still goes back to what has already been said. It is too vague and relative to the preconceptions and motivations of the reader to really so definitively be taken as such. People of course claim that is how it is to be taken, a great deal of more modern day thinkers of biblical texts are stating to say this nowadays, this is true. And yet, nowhere is it explicitly stated in this holy book of moral laws, this handbook to being a Christian, that that is how it is supposed to be. It is again, another thing that people have personally interpreted from the text, from their own desires and are putting it out there as the answer.

Simply put, the Bible is being used to justify another viewpoint...again.

[vtboy]

Bolded the part that stuck in my head....actually the Bible (Particularly the Old Testament!) doesn't like much of anyone who isn't a Jewish heterosexual male. The whole Old Testament is actually meant to be a covenant between the tribes of Israel and God...anyone else need not apply.

It isn't until Christ's death and Resurrection in the New Testament that Gentiles (everyone not Jewish) is given a path to God. So in actuality, anyone calling themselves Christian, should note the Old Testament simply as a, "The is where we came from" but not as a religious text because the only part of that book that is actually supposed to apply to them is the New Testament.

As I recall, all that OT stuff about Adam and Eve, the Flood, Lot's wife, Moses and the Ten Commandments, David and Goliath, Abrahan and Isaac, Job, etc., etc., is preached from Christian pulpits, as well as Jewish ones.

I am not a biblical scholar by any means, but I don't believe I've ever heard that the NT superseded the OT or that the former authorized disregard of the contents of the latter. I also suspect that Joshua, a Jew, likely observed the religious rituals and prohibitions of his day and his people. In my view, notwithstanding the NT, Christians take a serious risk if they wear mixed fabrics, place more than one beast of burden under a single yoke, or sacrifice blemished animals.

Forewarned is forearmed. 

[Stattick]

Jeremiah 10 prohibits Christmas trees. *nods*

[Beguile's Mistress]

I would love to have a Talmudic scholar read this thread and enlighten all of us.

In line with that I've been wondering how Hitler, Stalin and Mao would fare if viewed with the same microscope as the members of religious communities are being view.

[Sabby]

In line with that I've been wondering how Hitler, Stalin and Mao would fare if viewed with the same microscope as the members of religious communities are being view.

That really depends on whose holding the microscope... if you mean looking into Hitler in the same way an Atheist views the Theists leaders, they would probably say something very similar to what we already know.

But give the microscope to someone cut from the same cloth as Kent Hovind, Ray Comfort, or any VLOGer who likes to quote them (A Nazi Apologist in this case I guess) and you'd hear a whole lot about the economics of Pre-WW2 Germany, and not a lot about that whole genocide business... probably because Hitler had no idea it was happening. There's evidence to support that, ya know.

[Beguile's Mistress]

Suppose the allegations that all three were atheists or had atheistic leanings for some of most of their adult lives are accurate how did that philosophy (atheism) contribute to the mass murders of ethnic and religious groups, the suppression of child bearing by the government and the attempts to eradicate certain deviants and defectives (so-call by them) from the gene pool?  Conservative estimates support a death toll of 26,000,000 million between Hitler and Stalin alone.

[Sabby]

That would have swayed them about as much if they were raised Roman Catholics :P I really do not understand this one from either side of the fence. I've seen Athiests and Christians throw Hitler and Stalin back and forth like a hot potato trying to make it look like it belongs to the other guy, but it really doesn't matter...

Let's say Hitlers an Atheist. We have undeniable proof that he did not believe in any God of any kind, rejected the life style that period Christianity favored, and personally felt that Jewish genes should be removed from the planet to benefit Evolution. That just says he's an idiot and genocidal maniac who doesn't say Grace at dinner.

[Beguile's Mistress]

What about Stalin and Mao?

[Sabby]

I actually don't know them like I do Hitler... what with him being the closest thing to Satan allowed in school text books. I think pretty much everyone has a serviceable knowledge of Adolf Hitler. Stalin and Moa, however... is it because I grew up in another country that I have no idea who Moa is and confuse Stalin with Castro (who I only know in parody anyway)?

[vtboy]

What about Stalin and Mao?

You are not seriously suggesting, I hope, that the atheism of these mass murders was the productive cause of the genocides they perpetrated.

All three also had dark hair.

[Sabby]

I don't know about Moa, but didn't those other two have moustaches as well? Well kept moustaches at that... I know how maintaining a certain style of facial hair can integrate itself into your life. It becomes a part of the way you live.

You might even say... it was a doctrine.

Just saying ;) It's a slippery slope from 'my moustache is just and right' to 'woe to thee that wears curls'

[Beguile's Mistress]

I'm not suggesting anything at all.  Merely trying to see how atheists view this people who had influence on their governments, subordinates and the citizens of the countries they governed all of whom promulgated, assisted in, committed or excused these mass murderers and their cohorts.

There are arguments on both sides of the fence that speculate that these men and their supposed atheistic philosophies are at least in part responsible for their personal decisions regarding the eradication of millions of human beings for any reason they held viable.

[Callie Del Noire]

You are not seriously suggesting, I hope, that the atheism of these mass murders was the productive cause of the genocides they perpetrated.

All three also had dark hair.

You tar the majority with crimes of a few, it could be argued what is good for the gander is good for the goose. All three WERE athetists. Personally though, I think it was more a case of 'kill all who might oppose me' in the case of Moa and Stalin and severe crazy with Hitler.

I find it interesting that so few people realize that Stalin EASILY killed more people than Hitler did in his camps.

Don't know enough about Mao's actions myself.

[Caela]

As I recall, all that OT stuff about Adam and Eve, the Flood, Lot's wife, Moses and the Ten Commandments, David and Goliath, Abrahan and Isaac, Job, etc., etc., is preached from Christian pulpits, as well as Jewish ones.

I am not a biblical scholar by any means, but I don't believe I've ever heard that the NT superseded the OT or that the former authorized disregard of the contents of the latter. I also suspect that Joshua, a Jew, likely observed the religious rituals and prohibitions of his day and his people. In my view, notwithstanding the NT, Christians take a serious risk if they wear mixed fabrics, place more than one beast of burden under a single yoke, or sacrifice blemished animals.

Forewarned is forearmed.

Just cause the Christians preach it doesn't mean they should be and knowing the past of your religion is never a bad thing IMO.

As for my comment about the NT, superceding the OT, it's because the OT is meant to specifically be a pact between God and the tribes of Isreal. It's meant to be the law and how they are supposed to live to be found pleasing in God's sight until Messiah comes to forge a new path to God's grace. It didn't apply to Gentiles at all unless they converted to Judaism so, unless you're Jewish it still wouldn't apply to you. If you're a Christian then you are supposed to believe that Christ is the risen Messiah and it's through his life, death, and resurrection that you now come to God's grace...so the OT doesn't apply to you either because you no longer need that pact to come into God's grace, a new pact has been forged.

Think of it sort of like a contract. You have the original and in it there's a clause that says a new contract will be drafted when certain conditions are met. From a Christian perspective, those conditions were met through Christ's resurrection which was the writing of the new contract which trumps the old one per that clause in the original.

So Christians can wear mixed fabrics, yoke up as many animals as they want, and there's no need for any more sacrifices, blemished or not! :D

As for the first paragraph, touche and I concede to your point, your very accurate point. :P

As to the second, it still goes back to what has already been said. It is too vague and relative to the preconceptions and motivations of the reader to really so definitively be taken as such. People of course claim that is how it is to be taken, a great deal of more modern day thinkers of biblical texts are stating to say this nowadays, this is true. And yet, nowhere is it explicitly stated in this holy book of moral laws, this handbook to being a Christian, that that is how it is supposed to be. It is again, another thing that people have personally interpreted from the text, from their own desires and are putting it out there as the answer.

Simply put, the Bible is being used to justify another viewpoint...again.

Unfortunately, people will use a lot of things from religious texts, to psuedo-science, to twisting actual scientific results, to quotes from respected leaders (past and present) to try justify their viewpoints. Some of them you can swing around to a more humane point of view and some will scream like raving lunatic no matter what you say to them. Some people simple refuse to be wrong or admit to being misinformed no matter what you tell them. Those people you simply wash your hands of, and spend your time in a more productive manner.

[Torch]

I find it interesting that so few people realize that Stalin EASILY killed more people than Hitler did in his camps.

Don't know enough about Mao's actions myself.

Well, if we're going for an official Dictator Death Toll, I think Chairman Mao wins by a landslide.

The latest revised estimates (including famine victims, along with executions, gulag deaths and so on) for Stalin are in the 20 million range. Mao's victims (mostly from executions and starvation) range from 40 to 70 million.

[Oniya]

I've heard it said that one can find a Biblical quote to justify anything.  After all, gay marriage and marijuana were legalized on the same day.

Leviticus 20:13 – “if a man lays with another man, as with a woman, he should be stoned.”

*This badly-needed breath of humor brought to you by the Department Of Useless Biblical Trivia.*

[Sabby]

Quoted so friggen hard.

[vtboy]

You tar the majority with crimes of a few, it could be argued what is good for the gander is good for the goose. All three WERE athetists. Personally though, I think it was more a case of 'kill all who might oppose me' in the case of Moa and Stalin and severe crazy with Hitler.

I find it interesting that so few people realize that Stalin EASILY killed more people than Hitler did in his camps.

Don't know enough about Mao's actions myself.

I tar the majority with crimes of a few? Are you off your meds today, Callie?

I'm not suggesting anything at all.  Merely trying to see how atheists view this people who had influence on their governments, subordinates and the citizens of the countries they governed all of whom promulgated, assisted in, committed or excused these mass murderers and their cohorts.

Speaking as an agnostic who veers very close to atheism, I will tell you that I abhor Hitler, Stalin, and Mao (my list of despised homicidal despots is much longer, but these three should suffice for now). And, yes, of course the citizenry of their nations should have acted to stop them, at least while they were still able to do so.

In regard to Hitler, by the way, there is precious little evidence he was an atheist, and more than a little that he considered himself a Christian. Further, the Nazis attempted to establish a Protestant Reich Church which would effectively unify the Protestant churches of Germany and make them an organ of the Nazi party (like virtually every other institution in Nazi Germany). Though the effort met with mixed results, it stands in marked contrast with Stalin's and Mao's approaches which were to eliminate all religious institutions.

Martin Niebuhr, a cleric famous for his post-war poem about how the Nazis came for him after he failed to object to their coming after everyone else, was an early advocate of Nazism and its brand of anti-semitism. He was eventually sent off to a concentration camp where, after some time, he allegedly had his spiritual awakening. He was punished, however, not because he opposed the Nazis' oppression of the Jews (he did not), but because he opposed their attempts to dictate church doctrine.

Loathsome scum, all.

[Stattick]

Suppose the allegations that all three were atheists or had atheistic leanings for some of most of their adult lives are accurate how did that philosophy (atheism) contribute to the mass murders of ethnic and religious groups, the suppression of child bearing by the government and the attempts to eradicate certain deviants and defectives (so-call by them) from the gene pool?  Conservative estimates support a death toll of 26,000,000 million between Hitler and Stalin alone.

Atheism isn't a philosophy. It's an opinion. On one thing. When asked, "Do you believe in God?", atheists say, "No". That's all there is to atheism. To call atheism a philosophy is like trying to claim that people that don't drive is a philosophy. Some people don't drive because of well thought out philosophical reasons. Some don't drive because they don't like it. Some don't drive because they're not allowed to. Some don't drive because they've never had the opportunity. There's a huge spectrum of reasons why people don't drive, and they don't have any philosophical, rational, or religious underpinnings in common. The same is true of atheists.

Christians on the other hand have all kinds of commonalities. They all believe that at least parts of the Bible are literally true. They believe that the book was divinely inspired. They believe that salvation can only come through Christ. They believe that the Bible has relevance in today's world, and it's teachings should be studied. So Christians as a whole have a lot more commonality than atheists. One is a group that has a single trait in common, that has no more in common than a group of people that have naturally curly hair. The other is a group that has lots of commonalities, akin to fruit in a world that has lots of fruit and a lot of things that are not fruit.

To compare the "group actions" of Christians to atheists is to draw a false equivalence. One is a group that has many actual, real things in common, while the other is a group that has nothing in common except for a single trait. Actually, it's the lack of a single trait that the atheists share. A better analogy would be to compare Christians to fruit, with each different sort of Christian religion being a different sort of fruit; Catholics are apples, Methodists are pears, Baptists are grapes, Mormons are bananas, etc. Meanwhile atheists are something other than fruit; secular humanists are trees, atheist Buddhists are eyebrows, nihilists are stereo speakers, etc.

There's another clue here too: it's proper English to capitalize the names of religions, such as Methodist, Mormon, Catholic, or Christian, as they are proper nouns, a name of a religion. One does not capitalize atheist, except at the beginning of a sentence, since it isn't a proper noun. It doesn't denote a religion, philosophy, a group with common traits, or a community of similar people. It only denotes a group that for many, many different reasons doesn't believe in God, and doesn't otherwise speak of their cultural, philosophical, or religious similarities at all.

[vtboy]

Just cause the Christians preach it doesn't mean they should be and knowing the past of your religion is never a bad thing IMO.

As for my comment about the NT, superceding the OT, it's because the OT is meant to specifically be a pact between God and the tribes of Isreal. It's meant to be the law and how they are supposed to live to be found pleasing in God's sight until Messiah comes to forge a new path to God's grace. It didn't apply to Gentiles at all unless they converted to Judaism so, unless you're Jewish it still wouldn't apply to you. If you're a Christian then you are supposed to believe that Christ is the risen Messiah and it's through his life, death, and resurrection that you now come to God's grace...so the OT doesn't apply to you either because you no longer need that pact to come into God's grace, a new pact has been forged.

Well, I, for one, am willing to be educated.

So, if I understand you correctly, the Ten Commandments are binding on Jews, but not Christians. Interesting. But, I'll bet you dollars to donuts that the people who put them up on courthouse walls in this country are disproportionately Christian.

[Slywyn]

secular humanists are trees, atheist Buddhists are eyebrows, nihilists are stereo speakers, etc.

To try to bring a little amusement in here, this line made me laugh for reasons I'm not sure you intended. Or, if you did, you are very clever.

[TheGlyphstone]

There's another clue here too: it's proper English to capitalize the names of religions, such as Methodist, Mormon, Catholic, or Christian, as they are proper nouns, a name of a religion. One does not capitalize atheist, except at the beginning of a sentence, since it isn't a proper noun. It doesn't denote a religion, philosophy, a group with common traits, or a community of similar people. It only denotes a group that for many, many different reasons doesn't believe in God, and doesn't otherwise speak of their cultural, philosophical, or religious similarities at all.

Only one problem with this - pagans. As a group, They're much closer to Christians than atheists, despite being more of a catch-all term for 'non-Abrahamic religious' but it's rare that you see someone referred to as a Pagan, rather than a pagan.

[Beguile's Mistress]

I'm not comparing atheists to any person affiliated with a religion.

I'm comparing sins of the past, as is being done in this thread, with those who follow the same "opinions" as their forebears.

You can't have it both ways.  If you want to point the finger at the past you must point it at all of the past and not rationalize your stance on things if you want to be taken seriously.  It is way to easy to fall into the hypocrisy sink hole.

To clarify:  I do not hold people today responsible for the actions in the past any more than the many atheists I know personally are represented by those I see online.  As one of my atheist friends, a professor of philosophy, likes to say he practices the RTRR principle.  When discussing anything he likes to be respectful, tolerant, reasonable and rational rather than an idiot (his words).  It's kinda the way I like to try to roll.

If you feel that people affiliated with a religious body are a slap in the face to you try to get to know us as most of us are today and not in the shadows of the arrogant, power grabbing politicians of past and present who use religion as a tool and have no relation to that religion other than how they can use it.  The rule you use to judge is also used to measure you and when you bend down to pick up the stone ask yourself if you are perfect before you throw it.


EDIT:  I should say that the rule we use to judge is the rule we are judged by.

[Stattick]

To try to bring a little amusement in here, this line made me laugh for reasons I'm not sure you intended. Or, if you did, you are very clever.

I was having a little fun, and wrote what felt right. But I'm probably not quite clever enough to be able to take full credit for your mirth.

Secular humanists have quite a few different philosophies that they may or may not adhere to, but have a similar overall philosophy. This reminded me of trees. Some are fruit trees, some are nut trees, some are evergreen, some are deciduous, some grow slowly and strong, while other grow fast but weak.

Some Buddhist monks shave their eyebrows. But no matter how much they do or don't want their eyebrows to come back, they keep growing back, in roughly the same shape, just to be shaved off again. It reminded me of the reincarnation that Buddhists believe in.

Nihilists on the other hand... always seem so LOUD. And they seem to take so much pride in that it's so hard to pin them down to just one thing, because it always seems that they're trying to say two separate but similar things at the same time... like stereo speakers.

Catholics are apples, Methodists are pears, Baptists are grapes, Mormons are bananas, etc.

Catholics are apples: well, one of the most common fruits associated with the fruit of the Tree of Good and Evil in the Bible was the apple. The apple is associated with the fall from grace, the loss of innocence, and the need to regain grace (through religion). It is the beginning of things. And since the Catholics claim to be "the first" major form of Christianity, and "the one true faith", I thought that the apple seemed to be appropriate.

Methodists - I almost wrote Lutherans in the original, and I should have stuck with that, it would have worked a little better. At any rate, these Protestants believe that THEY'RE the true form of Christianity, coming along and "fixing" what the Catholic church got wrong. The pear is the other fruit associated with the Tree of Good and Evil, so by picking the pear, I was implying that Protestants not only think that THEY'RE the true faith, but they're also correcting those silly Catholics, because it was obviously a pear and not an apple.

Baptists are grapes. You know, because they wine a lot. Also, as an ex-Southern Baptist, I can tell you that Southern Baptists tend to be a very angry religion. And that reminded me of The Grapes of Wrath. Sorry, I was being punny. :P

And Mormons are bananas.  XD

[Stattick]

Only one problem with this - pagans. As a group, They're much closer to Christians than atheists, despite being more of a catch-all term for 'non-Abrahamic religious' but it's rare that you see someone referred to as a Pagan, rather than a pagan.

I nearly always capitalize it. But I'm Pagan. On the other hand, one can refer to pagans that aren't Pagans. There's the difference; pagans are non-Christian of any sort, while Pagans have a particular religion and philosophy (non-Christians of a specific sort). Many Pagans or Neo-Pagans are of a particular type and can and/or will differentiate what group they're a member of, much like many Christians will distinguish themselves by claiming to be a particular type of Christian such as Lutheran or Episcopalian.

[vtboy]

I'm not comparing atheists to any person affiliated with a religion.

I'm comparing sins of the past, as is being done in this thread, with those who follow the same "opinions" as their forebears.

You can't have it both ways.  If you want to point the finger at the past you must point it at all of the past and not rationalize your stance on things if you want to be taken seriously.  It is way to easy to fall into the hypocrisy sink hole.

To clarify:  I do not hold people today responsible for the actions in the past any more than the many atheists I know personally are represented by those I see online.  As one of my atheist friends, a professor of philosophy, likes to say he practices the RTRR principle.  When discussing anything he likes to be respectful, tolerant, reasonable and rational rather than an idiot (his words).  It's kinda the way I like to try to roll.

If you feel that people affiliated with a religious body are a slap in the face to you try to get to know us as most of us are today and not in the shadows of the arrogant, power grabbing politicians of past and present who use religion as a tool and have no relation to that religion other than how they can use it.  The rule you use to judge is also used to measure you and when you bend down to pick up the stone ask yourself if you are perfect before you throw it.


EDIT:  I should say that the rule we use to judge is the rule we are judged by.

I hope you understand the distinction between, on the one hand, criticizing religious doctrine and pointing out instances where its influence has been pernicious, and, on the other hand, attacking believers who have not been so influenced. There seems to have been a conflation of the two by some in this thread. 

[Beguile's Mistress]

I hope you understand the distinction between, on the one hand, criticizing religious doctrine and pointing out instances where its influence has been pernicious, and, on the other hand, attacking believers who have not been so influenced. There seems to have been a conflation of the two by some in this thread. 

People do bad things and some people do really horrendous things.  Hold the person accountable for the transgression not the organization.  Not all cops are dirty, not all politicians are corrupt, not all people who say they believe in a higher power want to convert you and not all atheists are godless heathens if any of them are.

Religion and politics are seldom discussed with objectivity because they are personal.  Therefore, being respectful of your fellows in conversation is a must.  To do otherwise could invalidate you opinion.

[Caela]

Well, I, for one, am willing to be educated.

So, if I understand you correctly, the Ten Commandments are binding on Jews, but not Christians. Interesting. But, I'll bet you dollars to donuts that the people who put them up on courthouse walls in this country are disproportionately Christian.

Technically speaking, the Ten Commandments were never binding on anyone but those of the Jewish faith. The OT is Jewish law, it never applied to anyone of any other faith or descent. It would be like saying that German law applies to me, as an American citizen, while still at home in the States. Some of them are pretty decent universal's (not murdering, not wasting time and energy coveting what other people have, not bearing false witness etc.) but they certainly don't apply, as religious tenets, to anyone else.

[Caela]

People do bad things and some people do really horrendous things.  Hold the person accountable for the transgression not the organization.  Not all cops are dirty, not all politicians are corrupt, not all people who say they believe in a higher power want to convert you and not all atheists are godless heathens if any of them are.

Religion and politics are seldom discussed with objectivity because they are personal.  Therefore, being respectful of your fellows in conversation is a must.  To do otherwise could invalidate you opinion.

+1

[Sabby]

People do bad things and some people do really horrendous things.  Hold the person accountable for the transgression not the organization.  Not all cops are dirty

Yes, but we have Internal Affairs. Not all cops are dirty, but it is the responsibility of all in the department to learn from past corruption and stop it from happening again. They don't watch yet another incursion of dirty cops and say "Boy howdy those individuals make all us public servants look like assholes. Best to just disapprove of their actions and move on"

Religion and politics are seldom discussed with objectivity because they are personal.  Therefore, being respectful of your fellows in conversation is a must.  To do otherwise could invalidate you opinion.

It's... really not. The whole 'don't discuss my religion, it's personal' is one of the catalysts for Christianity's stranglehold on the States :/ Things remain personal as long as they are kept between you and those it immediately involves. I like Call of Duty. This is personal. Me and my small group of friends all like Call of Duty. This is personal for each of us. We all come together and talk about our mutual love for Call of Duty. Now it is a communal issue, for a small community, and how our love of the game effects us as a whole is an entirely separate matter to how we as individuals enjoy them.

We all start a weekend group where we eat pizza and play some lan.

Now it turns out one of us thought Modern Warfare 3 was superior to Black Ops 2. Well, the rest of us agree that Blops2 is the best of the series, and that guy is simply wrong. We all opt to play Blops2 for this weekends get together, but this one individual would like us to play MW3 instead.

His personal opinion that MW3 is the better game is still his own personal belief and he is entitled to it, but the matter of MW3 vs Blops2 within the group is not sacred. We can and should discuss it.

He does not get to say "Leave my opinions alone, they are personal to me, you not incorporating my beliefs into the group is bullying", because that's a child acting as if we are taking away his ability to feel the way he does :P You want to play some MW3? Go home. Play it. Have fun. You want to play it at the weekend LAN? Better have some good reasons, because we're not changing our plans just because you feel strongly.

[vtboy]

People do bad things and some people do really horrendous things.  Hold the person accountable for the transgression not the organization.  Not all cops are dirty, not all politicians are corrupt, not all people who say they believe in a higher power want to convert you and not all atheists are godless heathens if any of them are.

Religion and politics are seldom discussed with objectivity because they are personal.  Therefore, being respectful of your fellows in conversation is a must.  To do otherwise could invalidate you opinion.

It is more than appropriate, in my view, to hold organizations, religious or not, accountable for their doctrines and for the actions taken by members in furtherance of those doctrines. I trust you would not quibble over holding the Nazi party, the CCCP, and the KKK accountable for the atrocities they have wrought.

Organizational accountability aside, I am getting a little tired of having to repeatedly deny the straw man argument that I hold A responsible for the acts of B simply because they belong to the same church. My earlier point in this thread was that scripture is not the pellucid moral beacon many claim it to be, as its teachings are vague and contradictory, and have provided warrant for bad acts as well as for good. How did you translate this into my holding all members of a religious group accountable for the bad acts of some?

If you take respect for others in the conversation to heart, please exercise a little more care to understand what they have written, and avoid ascribing to them views they have not expressed.

[Beguile's Mistress]

I forgot about games and gamers since I don't see them as life affirming opinions.  They are and should be hobbies like loyalty to your local sports teams or a preference for sitcoms over dramas on television.

However, any topic that results in raising anger levels and leaving any person(s) feeling alienated or attacked should not be discussed unless you can do so objectively because ranting, screaming and trying to shove your point of view down someone's throat are at the least counter productive.

In a group such as your you play what the majority votes to play.  Then if majority rules in that case why not in every case where one opinion comes up against another.  Taxpayers in a community all have an equal say in how tax money should be spent and there are legalities for having an referendum added to a ballot.  My payroll and property taxes give me a right to that vote that is equal to every other tax payer in the jurisdiction.  If a proposal is made to paint the communities parking meters purple and the referendum is put on the ballot people can choose yea or nay and majority rules not the opinions of atheists or the beliefs of the those who believe. 

It is more than appropriate, in my view, to hold organizations, religious or not, accountable for their doctrines and for the actions taken by members in furtherance of those doctrines. I trust you would not quibble over holding the Nazi party, the CCCP, and the KKK accountable for the atrocities they have wrought.

I don't hold Germans or Russians living today responsible for those actions or Christians living today responsible for those of the past either. 

Organizational accountability aside, I am getting a little tired of having to repeatedly deny the straw man argument that I hold A responsible for the acts of B simply because they belong to the same church. My earlier point in this thread was that scripture is not the pellucid moral beacon many claim it to be, as its teachings are vague and contradictory, and have provided warrant for bad acts as well as for good. How did you translate this into my holding all members of a religious group accountable for the bad acts of some?

If you didn't say that, if you truly can live side by side with people today no matter what then you aren't included in that are you?

If you take respect for others in the conversation to heart, please exercise a little more care to understand what they have written, and avoid ascribing to them views they have not expressed.

Likewise.  Nothing I've said is directed at any one person but at the general philosophy I am inferring from some of the posts in this thread.  If I quoted a remark of yours it was to discuss the remark and present my own point of view which is what discussion is all about. 

[Chris Brady]

Absolutely false. How is the absence of religious symbols from public places a representation of atheism? That one does not endorse one thing is not an endorsement of its competitor.

Because Belief does not care about Truth.

If you get enough people to believe something to be true, you can actually change things.  Some times for good, some times for ill.  But Truth does not matter in the end, only Belief does.

How else do you get men like Martin Luther King?  (Good.)  Or cults the KKK? (Bad.)

Because enough people BELIEVE in that message.

[Stattick]

It's not that simple. The lack of theological symbols in a public places is a representation of atheism. So by removing the ten commandments, bible verses, nativity scenes, and whatever from public places is still the government favoring one religion over another.

No, a lack of symbols means nothing. On the other hand, if we filled parks and courthouses with atheist symbols and statues of Dawkins (not Darwin, because he was a Christian), Nietzsche, and... um... other prominent atheists that spoke out against religion, then public places would be a representation of atheism. Not that I think we should do that. Although atheism isn't a religion or philosophy, our public places shouldn't be used to endorse or push an agenda like that.

[Braioch]

I'm sorry, but to throw Stalin and Mao into the pot with other atheists is ridiculous. (Not Hitler, as it's already been shown that he was a Christian) First off, the only sharing factor between those two and myself, is the lack of belief in god. Hell they might even have stated without a doubt that there is no god, I do not take that extra step. Secondly, with that in mine, you cannot say that their atheism is going to cause them to kill and maim. Because, that's all atheism is, a lack of belief in a higher power.

That's it.

No holy doctrine proclaiming one should kill a non-believer or blasphemer.
Nothing about killing those that are committing some odd and esoteric fallacy according to the doctrine of the book that's talking about it.

Nothing

These men did not use some great atheistic virtue or writings to justify their move to power, their mass murders, their sheer douchebaggery. They did it because they're dicks and they wanted power. What I'm trying to point out is there is no common denominator for their motivation between them and myself or any other atheist. There is nothing there other than atheism and whatever scientific fact they held to be true that would be similar to modern day ones. I highly doubt they were all the friendly on my more liberal political stances and what have you.


And yet...
Crusades? For God! Against the Blasphemers and Heretics!
Salem witch trials? (and the thousands of wretches in Europe burnt for the same) Welp, the bible says thou shalt not suffer a witch to live, better get on killing these whores of Satan here fast.
Inquisition? Well, we're good pure holy men, living by the bible and we know the devil and his evil is afoot in the land, we should totally fuck that up, because our book says that evil could be anywhere, and hey! Even tells us what to look for.

THAT is my point.

[Beguile's Mistress]

I really don't see a problem with including them.

Persecution is persecution whether it's done for political or religious reasons or in the name of religion for political and financial gains, with generous helpings of greed and avarice thrown in by the ruling families in the European countries who were too cowardly and scurrilous to openly go raiding, raping and land grabbing and used the Crusades in some cases as a way to get rid of the undesirables in their own kingdoms.

I really don't care who did what and when from the early 20th century and back as long all of them are tarred with the same brush.

[Braioch]

I'm not saying that Stalin and Mao shouldn't be condemned for what they did. Cruelty born of greed and ambition is still cruelty.

What I'm saying is that unlike with secular assholes, religious doctrine can easily be used to make normally decent people do awful things in the name of their God. Especially since so many of these awful things are condoned by the books in question.

[vtboy]

I really don't see a problem with including them.

Persecution is persecution whether it's done for political or religious reasons or in the name of religion for political and financial gains, with generous helpings of greed and avarice thrown in by the ruling families in the European countries who were too cowardly and scurrilous to openly go raiding, raping and land grabbing and used the Crusades in some cases as a way to get rid of the undesirables in their own kingdoms.

I really don't care who did what and when from the early 20th century and back as long all of them are tarred with the same brush.

If you are simply drawing up a list of people who have committed mass atrocities in the name of some ideology, then certainly Hitler, Stalin and Mao rank high on it, along with many clerics. But the ideologies Hitler, Stalin and Mao claimed to serve were not atheism which, as other posters have eloquently explained, is not an ideology at all.

So, if your point is that mass murdering atheists are as worthy of condemnation as the mass murdering faithful, I have no dispute with you. Similarly, if you fault Communism for providing an ideological justification for the horrendous deeds of Stalin and Mao, we are again on the same page. If, however, your point is that atheism was a productive cause of the horrors wrought by Stalin and Mao, in the way that religious doctrine provided cause for the miseries inflicted by Torquemada, Khomeini and Bin Laden, you are not being sufficiently discriminating in your thinking.

[Beguile's Mistress]

What I'm suggesting is that the doctrine, ideology, opinion or religion is not at fault.  It is the person who takes them and twists them to suit their own purpose for their own gain to satisfy their greed for power or money or both.  They don't care about the Bible, Quran or any other text that lays out some sort of guide for living.  They only care about themselves.  If the Bible hadn't been written Torquemada would have found another way.  If there was no Quran, Ten Commandments or other text to pervert and hold up as the banner for the cause all of those criminals would have found another way.

I don't hold Islam responsible for Bin Laden.  I hold Bin Laden responsible for his choices.  Each of those people you named and so many more perverted something that many look up to, twisted it and used it as a reason to do what they did.

There are people who see a rule and immediately try to break it.  They see a law and try to get around it.  They see a loophole and try to use it.  And it's all done for personal gain and satisfaction.  The rule, law or loophole isn't responsible for what people choose to do.

People are the cause, they are the root, they are responsible for what goes wrong.  Greed for money and power more than anything else is to blame.  I think it's wrong to blame the thing when it is the person who is at fault.  Only when the yelling stops and we all listen to each other will things have a chance of working out.  Anger and insults never solved anything.

[Chris Brady]

Atheism IS an ideology.  It requires belief in something no one can quantify.  Just as people can point to proof that there is no God, people can point to proof that there is.  And each is based on a personal set of criteria the person believes

There is no known quantifiable proof that God exists.  At the same time, there isn't any that proofs that there's no deity figure either.

[Slywyn]

I just don't really see how you can compare someone who murdered millions of people for their own, personal, reasons and someone who murdered hundreds of thousands in the name of a book.

They didn't do it because they wanted to, they did it because they believed in their hearts that their religion required them to, they felt that it was their duty to commit those atrocities. They didn't do it for personal gain. They didn't do it for plunder or just to see the world burn. They did it in the name of religion, in the name of their god.

Nothing else on this planet inspires that.

Atheism isn't an ideology. It's someone saying "I don't think there's a God". That's it. There's nothing else to it.

[Braioch]

Atheism IS an ideology.  It requires belief in something no one can quantify.  Just as people can point to proof that there is no God, people can point to proof that there is.  And each is based on a personal set of criteria the person believes

There is no known quantifiable proof that God exists.  At the same time, there isn't any that proofs that there's no deity figure either.

Except the 'proof' of existence is circumstantial and heresay at its best.
And also, most people whom are considered atheists will not lay out proof that there is no god, because there is none. So self-respecting individual with any appreciation of science and logic sets out to prove something doesn't exist. Most atheists simply state the truth, there is not enough proof to say for a fact that such a being exists, your claim, you bring the proof. Not vice versa.

So no, there is no unquantifiable 'belief,' there is no bloody ideology. If I have to go back to the old analogy, calling atheism an ideology, belief, religion, etc, is like saying not playing sports is a sport.

It doesn't work.

[Chris Brady]

Atheism isn't an ideology. It's someone saying "I don't think there's a God". That's it. There's nothing else to it.

And how is that different than someone saying, "I think there is a God."

[Slywyn]

And how is that different than someone saying, "I think there is a God."

People of faith believe there is a God. They have faith that he exists, that he is.

Atheists just think there isn't. There's no belief behind it, there's no faith. They're just "I don't think there is one."

[vtboy]

Atheism IS an ideology.  It requires belief in something no one can quantify.  Just as people can point to proof that there is no God, people can point to proof that there is.  And each is based on a personal set of criteria the person believes

There is no known quantifiable proof that God exists.  At the same time, there isn't any that proofs that there's no deity figure either.

That the existence of god can be neither proved nor disproved does not make atheism -- disbelief in the existence of god -- an ideology.

Here is the Merriam Webster definition of ideology:

"1: visionary theorizing

2 a: a systematic body of concepts especially about human life or culture

   b: a manner or the content of thinking characteristic of an individual, group, or culture

   c: the integrated assertions, theories and aims that constitute a sociopolitical program"

Religious doctrine fits at least 2a and 2b. Communist and Nazi docrine probably fit all four. Atheism fits none.

[Sabby]

And how is that different than someone saying, "I think there is a God."

It's a little thing called reasonable doubt. Not being able to disprove God is not grounds to believe in God.

It is an EXTRAORDINARY claim, and so it requires extraordinary evidence. I can't provide anything that will show you beyond a doubt that God exists, just like I can't provide the same to prove he does not exist. But this doesn't mean that both are equally sane options.

Take for instance my previous example. Rhubarb Frankfurter. It is a Godly Duck in space, and the Milky Way Galaxy is a gigantic boogeyboard that Rhubarb uses to traverse the stars in search of floating bread.

I cannot prove to you that we exist within a celestial stubby surfboard. There for, you are justified in rejecting my claim.

But you cannot prove to me that we are NOT in a celestial stubby surfboard. Does that justify my continued assertion that we are guided to the Bread of Paradise by Rhubarb?

No. No it does not. Because we know enough of space and time and reality to find the claim not only unreasonable, but ridiculous, and yes, we may not know EVERYTHING, but the chances of new evidence coming forward that completely destroys our entire understanding of physics (which is the grounds we use to reject that space is a duck pond) are so astronomically low that they are not worth considering. And until such a change happens, we are justified in assuming that our current understanding of space not being a duck pond is more reasonable then some alternate theory.

Does Rhubarb exist in exactly the way the Book of Quackerations tells us? He might. But we can reasonably doubt it.

[Stattick]

And how is that different than someone saying, "I think there is a God."

Because the belief in a God comes with a lot of baggage. It automagically implies religion, and the possibility that one can commune with the supernatural to gain insight or knowledge that one otherwise couldn't know, and perhaps also the possibility to get that God or those Gods to intercede in the real world on the believer's behalf. Humans are innately logical creature in some ways. And so, when someone believes in a God, and they pray for their God to intercede on their behalf, perhaps by making it rain so all the livestock doesn't die and all the crops don't wither and die, and then it does rain, well the human will naturally put those two together and assume that it was the prayer that led to the rain. Next time drought threatens, the believer will probably try to replicate the prayer that worked last time, therein creating ritual. In a lifetime, you can go from only the vaguest belief in the supernatural, to a full blown religion.

This sort of thing doesn't happen because of the disbelief in Gods. What builds from atheism? A critical view of the world, a skepticism of those that claim religion and/or that the supernatural is real. And frankly, many people don't even go down that path at all. In today's America though, you do tend to find a little more commonality among atheists, because we're derided by the majority, and have to defend ourselves regularly from them, if we make the mistake of letting it be known that we don't believe in God. There are huge swaths of the population that automagically assume that atheists are deceived fools, liars, or agents of Satan. So there's positive reinforcement for atheists to learn something about science, biology, genetics, geology, and so forth. There's pressure to learn something about history and philosophy as well. There's some pressure to learn rhetorical skills as well. There's also some pressure to learn self defense as well, because sometimes pissed off crusading Christians will physically assault an atheist. But all of this is because some segments of the Christian population won't shut the fuck up and leave atheists alone. If it weren't for that, most atheists would just leave well enough alone, and wouldn't feel the need to go poking at the religious. But because atheists get treated like shit by the religious majority, it creates a lot of resentment in some people, and they push back, say by putting up signs next to a nativity scene that say that religion is bunk.

There are also huge swaths of the population that make the mistake of believing that atheism is equivalent to religion, and so their knee jerk reaction is to believe that atheists get together in clubs once a week to worship Charles Darwin, to memorize holy text from Darwin's writings, and to sing Korn songs. They imagine that there's this community of atheists that can lean on each other, support each other, and do all those other things that religious people do at church. But, in fact, atheists don't have anything like that. We don't share a positive belief that draws us together like that. All we share is a negative belief, one that says, "I don't believe God exists." What would an atheist club do? Sit around and bitch about religion? That sounds... really fucking stupid. Doesn't sound like a good time at all. Other than that, I suppose they could teach and study genetics, geology, biology, upper mathematics, statistics, philosophy, and so forth. But I've already been to a place like that. It was called college. It was a lot of work. Most people won't go back to college, even if it's free, if they're not going to get anything other than knowledge from it. So... atheist club... not really a go.

On the other hand, it might be a lot of fun to get a bunch of people together to sing Korn songs every Sunday.

[TheGlyphstone]

Would they be the sacred hymns for your Church of the Kung Fu Dragon-Slaying Heart-Devouring Buddha?

[LunarSage]

Personally, I don't get atheism.  To not believe in anything... to solidly believe that when we die, we just blink out into nothingness, well just thinking about that possibility depresses the hell out of me.  If that's true, it means that life is meaningless and nothing we do matters. 

I can't believe that.

[Stattick]

Personally, I don't get atheism.  To not believe in anything... to solidly believe that when we die, we just blink out into nothingness, well just thinking about that possibility depresses the hell out of me.  If that's true, it means that life is meaningless and nothing we do matters. 

I can't believe that.

Welcome to existential terror. We have cookies. And Korn.

[Sabby]

Life only matters if its a prelude to a second, eternal state?

No. My life is precious because as far as I know, its all I got. Its human nature to wanna escape death, but to sacrifice the one life you know you have in the hopes of appeasing death is far more depressing Lunar...

Reality aint about wants. Reaper comes for us all one day.

[Scribbles]

LunarSage,

Speaking for myself and more as an agnostic than an atheist, I find it's more important to appreciate life than worry about death. I also believe that you contribute meaningfully simply by how you add to the lives of others.

[Beguile's Mistress]

There are also huge swaths of the population that make the mistake of believing that atheism is equivalent to religion, and so their knee jerk reaction is to believe that atheists get together in clubs once a week to worship Charles Darwin, to memorize holy text from Darwin's writings, and to sing Korn songs. They imagine that there's this community of atheists that can lean on each other, support each other, and do all those other things that religious people do at church. But, in fact, atheists don't have anything like that. We don't share a positive belief that draws us together like that. All we share is a negative belief, one that says, "I don't believe God exists." What would an atheist club do? Sit around and bitch about religion? That sounds... really fucking stupid. Doesn't sound like a good time at all. Other than that, I suppose they could teach and study genetics, geology, biology, upper mathematics, statistics, philosophy, and so forth. But I've already been to a place like that. It was called college. It was a lot of work. Most people won't go back to college, even if it's free, if they're not going to get anything other than knowledge from it. So... atheist club... not really a go.

On the other hand, it might be a lot of fun to get a bunch of people together to sing Korn songs every Sunday.

The frightening thing about threads like this is that there are self-professed atheists here who are holding themselves up as representative of atheism.  They make broad statements like the one highlighted above. 

I'm thankful that in my real life I know actual people who are atheists and are nothing like what I see here.  I'm frightened, though, that anyone not acquainted with atheism will get the wrong message by reading this thread and be turned.

Atheists Do Not Form Groups

Atheists Meetup Groups
New York City Atheists Meetings
Orange County Atheists
Local Atheist Group Leaders Working to Diversify Membership
Atheists United
Boulder Atheists
Metroplex Atheists
Omaha Atheists
Atheist Dating Service
United States Atheists
Atheist Discussion Group *
Atheists, Agnostics, & Freethinkers at NYU
East Bay Atheists, Berkeley CA
Portland Meetup
Atheist Coalition of San Diego
atheist-group-hold-first-meeting-saturday-at-fremont(See quote below)

The meeting's discussion topics will include media reports about atheism, the belief that God does not exist.

Atheist Nexus
Pantheism as "Sexed-up Atheism"

*They have a facebook page it seems or a link to one.

[LunarSage]

Life only matters if its a prelude to a second, eternal state?

To me, yes.

LunarSage,

Speaking for myself and more as an agnostic than an atheist, I find it's more important to appreciate life than worry about death. I also believe that you contribute meaningfully simply by how you add to the lives of others.

I do appreciate life... but to think that there is absolutely nothing after it is too frightening to even consider.

[Sabby]

Yes, Atheists form groups. Because they have to :/ Not for the same reasons a Church sends kids out on their bikes with flyers. In a mostly religious part of the world, outreach programs are important. To point to the fact there are Atheist social groups and conclude that all Atheists are bound by doctrine/that Atheism is a belief system is, to be completely honest... either knowingly dishonest or just plain ignorant.

[Oniya]

There are knitting and crochet groups, and even cross-stitch groups.  And while there might be heated discussions or even flaming over English vs. Danish method, or the belief that licking your thread leads to brown age-spots on the fabric, I doubt that could qualify any of them as religious groups - or even belief systems.

[Sabby]

There are knitting and crochet groups, and even cross-stitch groups.  And while there might be heated discussions or even flaming over English vs. Danish method, or the belief that licking your thread leads to brown age-spots on the fabric, I doubt that could qualify any of them as religious groups - or even belief systems.

+11

[Beguile's Mistress]

The statement was made that there are no groups.  No statement was made that there are churches.  Either there are groups for socialization and support or there aren't.  One is true and one is false and no amount of rationalization is going to change fact.

People reading this thread need to hear the truth and not a sanitized version of the "opinion" of a few.  They can Google atheism if they want the truth as I did.  They can expand the search to groups and meetings as I did.  They can find support for their beliefs as atheists call it if they want to look and not be left to feel alone and with no choice but what is offered here.

Yes, Atheists form groups. Because they have to :/ Not for the same reasons a Church sends kids out on their bikes with flyers. In a mostly religious part of the world, outreach programs are important. To point to the fact there are Atheist social groups and conclude that all Atheists are bound by doctrine/that Atheism is a belief system is, to be completely honest... either knowingly dishonest or just plain ignorant.

May I suggest you take it down a few notches?

[LunarSage]

BM wasn't suggesting that they qualify as religious groups... as far as I could tell, she was simply saying that there are atheist groups that do band together for fellowship and sometimes political influence (as evidenced by the atheist group that bought the lots in the CA incident) to promote their own agendas.

EDIT:  Ninja'd.  :P

[Sabby]

No one claimed there were not Atheist groups. The claim was that Atheism is not inherently anything besides a lack of belief. Most religious belief systems revolve around community and tradition. We do not. There is no common threads between Atheists, as has been discussed before, only a common understanding that we've all come to.

[Beguile's Mistress]

Please go back and read the quote in my post with the list of groups.

Also, according to another diatribe somewhere atheists don't use the word belief.  Check the list and click the link with the quote.  I didn't make that up.

[LunarSage]

That does kind of hit on the main reason why most atheists tend to grate on me.  Even in a debate, their overall message seems to be "you're a damned idiot if you believe in anything but nothing".  I personally find that attitude more than a bit offensive.

[Kythia]

I don't feel Stattick's point about atheists having nothing in common other than a disbelief in God holds water.  They are a recognisable demograph - more likely to be right wing, more likely to be male and so forth.  Probably hundreds of other factors as well.  There are broad strokes that can be drawn about atheists just as there is about any group.  The issue is that saying "all atheists" isn't like saying "all brown eyed people" (i think thats the example you used) because, crucially, atheists are a self-selected group.  Obviously that group will have things in common.

[Valerian]

The frightening thing about threads like this is that there are self-professed atheists here who are holding themselves up as representative of atheism.  They make broad statements like the one highlighted above. 

I'm thankful that in my real life I know actual people who are atheists and are nothing like what I see here.  I'm frightened, though, that anyone not acquainted with atheism will get the wrong message by reading this thread and be turned.

Atheists Do Not Form Groups

Atheists Meetup Groups
New York City Atheists Meetings
Orange County Atheists
Local Atheist Group Leaders Working to Diversify Membership
Atheists United
Boulder Atheists
Metroplex Atheists
Omaha Atheists
Atheist Dating Service
United States Atheists
Atheist Discussion Group *
Atheists, Agnostics, & Freethinkers at NYU
East Bay Atheists, Berkeley CA
Portland Meetup
Atheist Coalition of San Diego
atheist-group-hold-first-meeting-saturday-at-fremont(See quote below)Atheist Nexus
Pantheism as "Sexed-up Atheism"

*They have a facebook page it seems or a link to one.

Well, I'm fairly sure that no one here has been holding themselves up as being representative of atheism.  I haven't seen that at all.  The point most have been trying to make is that there isn't enough commonality among atheists to make them qualify as a cohesive group, as those who are religious tend to be.

Also, I'm not sure what you mean by 'turned', as I also haven't noticed anyone attempting to recruit more atheists.  I'm basically an atheist, but I wouldn't dream of trying to convince anyone else to be one.  To each their own.  (I also wouldn't join any sort of a group, but that's because I'm shy and would dread the meetings.  ::))

Let me try to sum up the gist of what I think many people have been trying to say here.  The lives of those who are religious (have faith, in whatever sort of divine power they might believe in) are actively shaped by that faith and/or doctrine.  Faced with a difficult decision, a Christian asks what Jesus would do, for example.

The lives of those who are atheists are not shaped by their atheism.  I don't think about my lack of religious beliefs at all as a rule.  Why should I?  Religion has never had any significant part in my life and almost certainly never will.  My decisions are shaped by my experiences, the experiences of others, and the values my dad taught me.  Other atheists will have their own unique experiences and differing values, therefore we'll have very little commonality.

Please go back and read the quote in my post with the list of groups.

Also, according to another diatribe somewhere atheists don't use the word belief.  Check the list and click the link with the quote.  I didn't make that up.

That's apparently the opinion of one group and shouldn't be applied to everyone who calls themselves atheist.  Not all atheists will have the same aversion to any particular word.  We're not all in that particular bunch, or even any bunch at all, necessarily.

That does kind of hit on the main reason why most atheists tend to grate on me.  Even in a debate, their overall message seems to be "you're a damned idiot if you believe in anything but nothing".  I personally find that attitude more than a bit offensive.

I've... never heard anyone say that.  That sounds like nihilism.

[Beguile's Mistress]

LunarSage,

Speaking for myself and more as an agnostic than an atheist, I find it's more important to appreciate life than worry about death. I also believe that you contribute meaningfully simply by how you add to the lives of others.

I do appreciate my life and celebrate it what little I have left thanks to someone who decided that beating me to bloody pulp was an appropriate response to my refusal to have sex with him.  He's an atheist too but I don't think that caused his deviant behavior.

I'm going to die but while I live I do the best I can to be a positive influence on the lives of others.  I believe in a hereafter, in a place where we all can go to meet up with others and where there is love without sadness and eternal life without sickness or disease.  I believe that the quality of our life after the death of our bodies is a direct reflection of the way we live our lives now.  I believe in a glorious and blessed eternity and nothing is going to change that for me least of all the prospect of an empty void filled with darkness and loneliness or as some would like to have it an abrupt cessation of our consciousness.

[LunarSage]

I've... never heard anyone say that.  That sounds like nihilism.

Atheism means you don't believe in an afterlife, right?  That we just switch off into nothingness when we die? 

I've heard plenty of atheists with condescending attitudes when speaking to those who hold some sort of religion, as though they know in their cocky hearts that they're smarter than religious folks because of their belief that there is no higher power.  Most of which have been online.

[Sabby]

Just like with 'theory', you're confusing different uses of the word belief.

And take what down a few notches? :/ If you took that as personal, then you read it wrong. I said the assertion that Churches and Atheism are the same because they form groups was either dishonest or ignorant. You did not make that claim, as you clarified. So why would you be offended over a claim you did not make?

And Lunar, forgive me, but where do you get this impression? An understanding of reasonable doubt does not equal 'all beliefs are stupid'. Do you believe in Rhubarb Frankfurter? No? Well aren't you close minded then? Just because there's no rational reason to believe in him doesn't mean he don't exist.

You simply have a flawed understanding of Atheism, and you've displayed you have no desire to entertain the possibility of nothing beyond life. If you weren't so afraid of even considering it, you might realize Atheism does not say there is no afterlife. Just that no testable model has been presented, and no plausible theories, based on our current understanding of the world.

[Valerian]

Atheism means you don't believe in an afterlife, right?  That we just switch off into nothingness when we die? 

I've heard plenty of atheists with condescending attitudes when speaking to those who hold some sort of religion, as though they know in their cocky hearts that they're smarter than religious folks because of their belief that there is no higher power.  Most of which have been online.

Not quite.  Atheists are unconvinced about the possibility of an afterlife -- at least that's my take on it.  Nihilism is the view that nothing should be believed in because nothing is truly real and life is senseless.

If you believe in a religious afterlife, I wouldn't dream of being condescending about it.  I'm not sure how many actual atheists are in my circle, but I really don't even know anyone who would behave like that.

[Beguile's Mistress]

Thank you, Valerian.

I know quite a few Atheists (with a capital A that they use) who are rational and reasonable.  They have groups that they compare to congregations of religious and they meet frequently in each others homes as believers still do on occasion.  They support and encourage each other in their own beliefs.  Belief is a word they use for what has been called "opinion" at times.

My concern is that the number of people starting out in their adult endeavors need to see that there are other options open to them as atheists if that is what they choose. 

I personally don't care if a person wants to worship sink holes or call a fire hydrant god.  I know what I believe and how I feel about my faith and I do my best to keep it too myself and live my life as one who believes in heaven and an eternity with my god.

I don't know why it's wrong to feel that way and to be lumped in with a group I don't subscribed to.  If every atheist approaches their choice in a personal way then every person should have that option.  When a remark is made that atheists do not form groups why is it wrong to show there are groups of atheists out there who get together to discuss their choice and learn and study and support each other?  I'm not criticizing anyone or anything.  I'm pointing out a truth.

By turned I mean being led astray with the belief that all atheists are the same and are like those who say "I am an atheist and this is what you should be, too."  I don't like anger and I don't like hate.  I don't hate atheists.  I never have and never will.  I try to be open-minded and if anything my participation in this thread has less to do with religion or faith than it does with honesty and truth.  If I see an error I try to provide alternative information.  If there is reference material out there that say there are not groups of atheists I would welcome the information.

[Scribbles]

I do appreciate my life and celebrate it what little I have left thanks to someone who decided that beating me to bloody pulp was an appropriate response to my refusal to have sex with him.  He's an atheist too but I don't think that caused his deviant behavior.

Sorry Beguile, that's awful...

Just to be clear, I was definitely not trying to insinuate that those who believe in something after death don't appreciate life, I was just trying to offer my own view of death and hoped it might offer some insight into the views of others.

I do appreciate life... but to think that there is absolutely nothing after it is too frightening to even consider.

I don't doubt it, I used to be afraid of what comes after too.

[Beguile's Mistress]

And take what down a few notches? :/ If you took that as personal, then you read it wrong. I said the assertion that Churches and Atheism are the same because they form groups was either dishonest or ignorant. You did not make that claim, as you clarified. So why would you be offended over a claim you did not make?

Because your post appeared to imply that you were responding to mine with the list of groups and as the only post that pointed out that there actually are many groups of Atheists or atheists I couldn't see an alternative meaning.

[LunarSage]

Not quite.  Atheists are unconvinced about the possibility of an afterlife -- at least that's my take on it.  Nihilism is the view that nothing should be believed in because nothing is truly real and life is senseless.

If you believe in a religious afterlife, I wouldn't dream of being condescending about it.  I'm not sure how many actual atheists are in my circle, but I really don't even know anyone who would behave like that.

What you're describing as Atheism sounds a lot like what I consider to be Agnostic... the belief that one doesn't know all the answers when it comes to a god.

Being unconvinced and solidly believing that god does not exist are two different things in my eyes.

[Valerian]

What you're describing as Atheism sounds a lot like what I consider to be Agnostic... the belief that one doesn't know all the answers when it comes to a god.

Being unconvinced and solidly believing that god does not exist are two different things in my eyes.

Buddhists, for example, do not believe in a god but do believe in an afterlife, in the form of reincarnation.  So it's perfectly possible to be an atheist and still hope for an afterlife.

It still seems like what you were describing earlier was nihilism, though.

[Remiel]

What you're describing as Atheism sounds a lot like what I consider to be Agnostic... the belief that one doesn't know all the answers when it comes to a god.

Being unconvinced and solidly believing that god does not exist are two different things in my eyes.

I agree.  The way I understand it, the Atheist (although perhaps Humanist would be a better term) says: "There is no god, no heaven, no hell.  All the mysteries of the universe are within the realm of understanding and science, we just haven't yet evolved to the point where we can make sense of them."

The Agnostic, on the other hand, says: "There could be a divine entity, I suppose, at work in the universe.  I just haven't seen any evidence to support this claim."

[Sabby]

It was. And as I said, you went on to clarify your point. I was responding to something unclear and you answered.

And Lunar, Atheism and Agnostism are not mutually exclusive.  You can be an Agnostic Atheism. I for one am open to the existence of ghosts, but I won't pretend to know how that could be proven true, and I'm also completely ready for a day when we know without a doubt that what we call a ghost is a scientific impossibility.

Q: What's the difference between an atheist and an agnostic?

A: It has to do with the difference between what you believe and what you think you know. For any particular god that you can imagine, a "theist" is one who has a belief in that god. In contrast, an "atheist" is one who does not have a belief in the god. A "gnostic" is one who knows about the existence of god and an "agnostic" is one who thinks that god is unknowable.

Notice that the terms "atheist" and "agnostic", by these definitions, are not mutually exclusive. You could be an agnostic atheist, meaning you don't think that the existence of gods is knowable, but you don't choose to believe in one without further proof. Many people assume that atheists believe that gods can be proved not to exist, but this isn't strictly true and there is no proper word to describe this. You could call such a person an "untheist", perhaps. Or, you could just call such a person a "gnostic atheist", one who doesn't believe in a god and thinks that his non-belief can be proved.

So there are four possible ways one could be.

1. Agnostic-Theist: believes god exists, but the existence of a god is unknowable
2. Gnostic-Theist: believes in a god for which he claims knowledge
3. Agnostic-Atheist: does not believe god exists, but it can't be proved
4. Gnostic-Atheist: believes it can be proved that god does not exist

Case 3 is sometimes referred to as "weak atheism" and case 4 is sometimes referred to as "strong atheism". Only strong atheism positively asserts that there are no gods.

Finally, it should be pointed out that when a person is asked about their beliefs and replies that they are agnostic, they are avoiding the question and answering a different one. Someone who can't positively say he/she believes in a god is an atheist.

Going by this, I am actually pretty torn over which I fit... on one hand, I fit in category 3 because I don't believe something as ill defined as God can ever be reliably tested and thus proven to not exist.

On the other hand, I fit into 4 because the various concepts and ideas of 'Gods' or higher powers lead me to believe that nothing like them could be possible without a radical shift in our understanding of the universe.

I guess this makes me a category 3.5 Atheist xD

[Remiel]

4. Gnostic-Atheist: believes it can be proved that god does not exist

But that's impossible.  That's like me saying, "I can prove that there are no unicorns in the world."    Certainly, no one has ever seen a unicorn, and we have absolutely no evidence that suggests unicorns exist, but it is logically impossible for me to claim that there are no unicorns in the world.   One cannot prove the negative of an assertion. 

[Sabby]

And what is a unicorn? A beast of mythology, or a recessive equine gene? You need to establish what something is before it is named true or false.

And we've gone thousands of years unable to establish what exactly God is. So yes, we cannot prove some intangible to be none existant, just like we cannot prove the immaterial to exist.

But people apply knowable models to God, and this is something we can actually test. Someone claims God manifests in any way, then it is testable.

Just like the genes for a horned horse can be found. Does it prove there were unicorns if we findthe genes? No. Does it show a unicorn is within the realm of possibility? Yes. Does the lack of a gene justify our belief that unicorns likely never existed? Yes.

[Remiel]

Well, to continue with this analogy, when Charles Darwin visited the Galapagos islands in 1835, he catalogued many new species of animals previously not known to exist.  Indeed, new animal species are still being discovered today.

EDIT: THE ONIYAPEDIA STRIKES AGAIN!

So it's logically possible, although highly improbable, that there might be a species of horned albino equine somewhere on the planet that we haven't, for whatever reason, discovered until now.

My point is that it is impossible to claim that "God doesn't exist, and I can prove it".  That doesn't mean we shouldn't approach the matter with a healthy degree of skepticism. 

However, I don't think that the issue of whether God exists objectively or not is germaine to the original discussion, which is about faith, a deeply personal and subjective topic.

--
edit: fixed typo and added quotation marks to prevent confusion.

[Sabby]

Then a line must be drawn between personal faith and religion to continue.

[Zeitgeist]

I am reminded of the cheeky and popular Internet mime that made its way through Facebook. It essentially said this:

If you're not gay then don't marry someone who is.

This was presumably a response to people who opposed gay marriage. If you're not gay, then you have nothing to worry about. Okay.

If you're not Christian, then don't observe Christian holidays.

Everyone of course is free to worship or observe holidays as they see fit but nothing in the constitution give license to any group and least of all the government, to impede upon others rights to practice and believe as they wish. Perhaps California should not offer up public space for these kinds of displays. If you want a nativity scene in your front yard, knock yourself out. If you're an atheist and you want to put up signs in your yard denigrating religion, knock yourself out.

If someone is going to espouse liberal inclusiveness, you don't get to pick and choose which groups you want to include. You're either inclusive or you are not. 

[Chris Brady]

Personally, I don't get atheism.  To not believe in anything... to solidly believe that when we die, we just blink out into nothingness, well just thinking about that possibility depresses the hell out of me.  If that's true, it means that life is meaningless and nothing we do matters. 

I can't believe that.

But, but... 'Belief'?  I thought atheists don't believe at all.  But to deny the existence of a deity figure(s) according to you requires belief.  But atheists deny that it's a belief...

This is not facetious, this is mind boggling to me.

To me, to an outsider here, who isn't sure about any of this, when I listen to Atheists claiming that they are sure that there is no God, and have all sorts reasons as to why, sounds very much like a belief system.  And to say that Atheism don't have 'baggage' that other 'religions' have is bull pucky.  Walk up to an Atheist and ask them politely about why they agree with it and really listen to what they say, rather than how, and you will see that it is as full as personal life experiences and choices and beliefs as any properly worshipped religion.

Atheism is as much a religion as Christianity to me.  Which, in my eyes, as long as it's respectful, is worthy of my ear and respect.  Whether or not I personally agree with it.

[Stattick]

The frightening thing about threads like this is that there are self-professed atheists here who are holding themselves up as representative of atheism.  They make broad statements like the one highlighted above. 

I'm not a representative of anything. Hell, I'm not even an atheist. I didn't mean to imply that I was an atheist, or that I speak for them.

I don't feel Stattick's point about atheists having nothing in common other than a disbelief in God holds water.  They are a recognisable demograph - more likely to be right wing, more likely to be male and so forth.

If either of those links said anything of the sort, I missed it. The first was a story talking about how religious people in Britain tended to be more left wing. The second link was to an image file of a poll.

4. Gnostic-Atheist: believes it can be proved that god does not exist

Yeah, that's some Grade A stupid right there. In science, you can't prove a negative.



Also, there's apparently atheist social clubs. My mind's blown. I've been around for 41 years, and it's the first I've heard of an atheist club. Still, I'm willing to bet a glazed doughnut that most of them aren't very church like at all, and that the overwhelming majority of atheists aren't members of such a club. But I'm willing to be proven wrong.

[Stattick]

Walk up to an Atheist and ask them politely about why they agree with it and really listen to what they say, rather than how, and you will see that it is as full as personal life experiences and choices and beliefs as any properly worshipped religion.

I've never talked to an atheist who's claimed to have had a supernatural experience that convinced them that God doesn't exist. I've never talked to an atheist that claims to have studied science and math textbooks and had gotten a lot of comfort from them, or gotten a deeper understanding of existence. I've never talked to an atheist that's gone to talk to a scientist when they've struggled with a moral quandary, and have gotten sage advice. I really don't understand what on earth you're trying to say here, other than "Atheism is a religion". Honestly, to me, it just sounds like you're making stuff up.

[Sabby]

They mostly pop up when organization is needed. A group of 100% Atheists are unlikely to group up in any official capacity. But in an area like Austin, Texas, where Religion is a vocal and powerful majority, things like the Atheist Community of Austin pop up in response to this.

[Torch]

But in an area like Austin, Texas, where Religion is a vocal and powerful majority, things like the Atheist Community of Austin pop up in response to this.

You've never been to Austin, have you? Seeing as how you live in Australia, I'm going to guess you haven't. If you had, you would have realized the folly of your assumption.

I have been to Austin, and I lived in Texas for seven years. Austin is about as left-wing as one can get (in Texas, anyway). You might want to do a bit of research on a city before making statements like that.

[Sabby]

Whoops, my bad. >.< I just assumed it was more localized, but Texas is a very religious state. I apologize.

[Torch]

The only "vocal and powerful majority" in Austin are music fans.

Or Longhorn fans during football season.  ::)

While Texas may be a Red State, the city of Austin is most assuredly not.

[Sabby]

Still, my point was they formed in response to other groups.

[Caela]

Still, my point was they formed in response to other groups.

Sometimes, but not always. Sometimes people form a group, not because of other groups in the area, but just to make it easier to find like-minded individuals. In a large city it's easier to make a group with a planned meeting place and set time then it is to just try and pick random people out of a crowd.

[Sabby]

Oh, of course, but do you think a lack of belief in something will even be noticed, let alone congeal into an organized group, unless that specific belief raised its head? How many of you thought of how silly Rhubarb is before I brought him up? No one. And no ones going to form a meeting until I start trying to give pop up versions of the Book of Quackerations to kids.

This is the major thing to remember. Atheism is a rejection of a claim based on reasonable doubt. trying to demonstrate atheism happens without the presence of the rejected claim is like saying fire fighters living in Atlantis still end up building a fire station.

[Braioch]

But, but... 'Belief'?  I thought atheists don't believe at all.  But to deny the existence of a deity figure(s) according to you requires belief.  But atheists deny that it's a belief...

This is not facetious, this is mind boggling to me.

To me, to an outsider here, who isn't sure about any of this, when I listen to Atheists claiming that they are sure that there is no God, and have all sorts reasons as to why, sounds very much like a belief system.  And to say that Atheism don't have 'baggage' that other 'religions' have is bull pucky.  Walk up to an Atheist and ask them politely about why they agree with it and really listen to what they say, rather than how, and you will see that it is as full as personal life experiences and choices and beliefs as any properly worshipped religion.

Atheism is as much a religion as Christianity to me.  Which, in my eyes, as long as it's respectful, is worthy of my ear and respect.  Whether or not I personally agree with it.

I'm addressing this first because it struck me dumb for a minute there.

Let's look at belief:

be·lief  [bih-leef]
noun
1.
something believed; an opinion or conviction: a belief that the earth is flat.
2.
confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof: a statement unworthy of belief.
3.
confidence; faith; trust: a child's belief in his parents.
4.
a religious tenet or tenets; religious creed or faith: the Christian belief.

Only one of those has spiritual or religious overtones. The rest are all completely secular, you do not have to equate belief with religion/spirituality. Anymore than you do with the word 'faith.' I believe that people are good, I believe that my loved ones will be there for me, I believe that I will do whatever I can for them as well. This has nothing to do with any spiritual overtones, none. I detest that so many, including some of my fellow atheists, feel the need to avoid this word for that reason.

Yes, life experiences bring someone to atheism, just as it brings someone to a political or behavioral standpoint. Yet the logic remains true, there is no conclusive, concrete (or anything resembling it) evidence of a higher power. This, again, is the one and only real statement of atheism, that there is no proof of a higher power. Only the most cocksure and in my opinion, arrogant and incorrect atheists will stand right up and say, "there is definitely no god." Most fall into agnostic-atheism, that there is no proof.

Personally, I don't get atheism.  To not believe in anything... to solidly believe that when we die, we just blink out into nothingness, well just thinking about that possibility depresses the hell out of me.  If that's true, it means that life is meaningless and nothing we do matters. 

I can't believe that.

Now this.

Many people slip into that when the idea comes to them, we're raised in a world where almost everyone around us believe our consciousness goes on. It's a common human need to believe that we're important, important enough that not even death can stop us. We have to be important enough to go on afterwards right?

For the record, meaningless? Of course it's meaningless, inherently. Yet, we have minds don't we? The ability to discern and decide, to reason and to choose. So why not choose to give your life meaning? Why does there have to be some higher power to give your life meaning? My life has meaning because I have given it meaning, I strive to give it meaning everyday of my life and will not stop with that. Atheism is not the end of meaning, it is not pointless existence swirling around in a void of cold nothingness until all sinks into decay. (That's pure Nihilism)

You make your own life, you make this one life your paradise, or your perdition and you shape the world around you by your actions. You shape your own life, and those around you. I don't know about you, but I don't need an afterlife or a god to make my life meaningful, to feel love and a need to be a good person. I choose to be a good person, and I have all the love I could need and then some, from those around me, they are all I need. Not some sky deity, not a holy book, nothing will ever, ever compare to the people in my life, the people whom I love, cherish and hold above all else.

[Kythia]

I don't feel Stattick's point about atheists having nothing in common other than a disbelief in God holds water.  They are a recognisable demograph - more likely to be right wing, more likely to be male and so forth.

If either of those links said anything of the sort, I missed it. The first was a story talking about how religious people in Britain tended to be more left wing. The second link was to an image file of a poll.

Errrm, I'm little confused.  Suspect I've misunderstood you.  Yes, granted, the story (and the poll in fact though that was less clear) were UK specific which I didn't think of before posting so sure, other countries may have different spreads.  But it seems fairly cut and dried that if religious people are more likely to be left wing then areligious are more likely to be right, its just phrasing it the opposite way.  And the stats at the top of the poll show the "more likely to be male" thing pretty clearly, I felt.

Meh, its not massively important.  But in looking for other sources apparently Wikipedia has a page on the demographics of atheism with US specific information if you'd prefer that. 

[LunarSage]

Awesome for you.  I don't work that way, though.  Life without an afterlife has absolutely no meaning to me.

Now this.

Many people slip into that when the idea comes to them, we're raised in a world where almost everyone around us believe our consciousness goes on. It's a common human need to believe that we're important, important enough that not even death can stop us. We have to be important enough to go on afterwards right?

For the record, meaningless? Of course it's meaningless, inherently. Yet, we have minds don't we? The ability to discern and decide, to reason and to choose. So why not choose to give your life meaning? Why does there have to be some higher power to give your life meaning? My life has meaning because I have given it meaning, I strive to give it meaning everyday of my life and will not stop with that. Atheism is not the end of meaning, it is not pointless existence swirling around in a void of cold nothingness until all sinks into decay. (That's pure Nihilism)

You make your own life, you make this one life your paradise, or your perdition and you shape the world around you by your actions. You shape your own life, and those around you. I don't know about you, but I don't need an afterlife or a god to make my life meaningful, to feel love and a need to be a good person. I choose to be a good person, and I have all the love I could need and then some, from those around me, they are all I need. Not some sky deity, not a holy book, nothing will ever, ever compare to the people in my life, the people whom I love, cherish and hold above all else.

[Valerian]

But, but... 'Belief'?  I thought atheists don't believe at all.  But to deny the existence of a deity figure(s) according to you requires belief.  But atheists deny that it's a belief...

This is not facetious, this is mind boggling to me.

To me, to an outsider here, who isn't sure about any of this, when I listen to Atheists claiming that they are sure that there is no God, and have all sorts reasons as to why, sounds very much like a belief system.  And to say that Atheism don't have 'baggage' that other 'religions' have is bull pucky.  Walk up to an Atheist and ask them politely about why they agree with it and really listen to what they say, rather than how, and you will see that it is as full as personal life experiences and choices and beliefs as any properly worshipped religion.

Atheism is as much a religion as Christianity to me.  Which, in my eyes, as long as it's respectful, is worthy of my ear and respect.  Whether or not I personally agree with it.

Braioch already covered the belief part -- it's a very common misconception, it seems, to equate 'belief' with spirituality when the word really isn't that limited.

I'm certainly not absolutely sure there's no god of any sort.  But if you were to ask me what life experiences shaped that opinion, I wouldn't even know what to say.  There aren't any.  No one ever brought me to church when I was a child.  Except for weddings and funerals, I've never set foot in any Christian church as far as I can recall.  No epiphany has ever led me to believe in a higher power, just as no epiphany ever convinced me not to believe in a higher power.  So it would be most accurate to say that a lack of a certain type of life experience is what shaped that particular view of the world.

Let me also add that I'm not holding this up as a representative experience of a 'real atheist'.  I don't think of myself as a typical case, mainly because I doubt there is a typical case.  Exposure to religious doctrine, and / or others who have religious faith seems to me to be a prerequisite for theism, but there's no comparable, widespread prerequisite for atheism that I can think of.

I also don't walk around thinking of myself as an atheist.   That's a very, very small part of who I am overall.  On the other hand -- and please do correct me if I'm wrong -- those who are religious seem to me to think about their faith quite often.  That's going to create at least the impression that a particular group of religious people have more in common, in general, than a particular group of atheists, even if they all happen to get together every Tuesday night.  Correct or not, that's how it's going to look most of the time.

Also, I am amused at the possibility that I'm bucking the trend by being a liberal female who lacks religious belief.  Yet another way in which I'm just not very feminine, I guess.   ::)

[Braioch]

Awesome for you.  I don't work that way, though.  Life without an afterlife has absolutely no meaning to me.

That seems rather sad to me.

Also, I am amused at the possibility that I'm bucking the trend by being a liberal female who lacks religious belief.  Yet another way in which I'm just not very feminine, I guess.   ::)

I'm bucking half of it, as I'm thoroughly liberal, if that helps any. :P

[LunarSage]

That seems rather sad to me.

*shrugs*

You're certainly welcome to that belief.  I think not believing in a higher power is sad.

[Sabby]

Okay, let's say there are two possible outcomes here. Let's ignore that we have no idea if an afterlife is even a good thing. Haunting until you fade to nothing sounds kind of horrible.

Option 1. There is no afterlife. Your mortal life is meaningless to you.

Option 2. There is an afterlife. Your mortal life is an eyes blink before eternity.

Both sound like a very sad and empty lives. I honestly see no motivation to continue living. There's either nothing for you in the material world and it has to end for you to gain your afterlife, or there's nothing period.

[LunarSage]

Yep, pretty much.

[Sabby]

So why are you here? Honest question, meant in no way to offend or antagonize. I am seriously curious and perplexed, and I will ask bluntly.

Why don't you kill yourself? Why continue this life?

If you don't feel comfortable answering, I understand. But this is the logical conclusion of this discussion, and this question will be askee at some point. Choose not to answer, and we've reached the limit of what we can discuss.

[LunarSage]

So why are you here? Honest question, meant in no way to offend or antagonize. I am seriously curious and perplexed, and I will ask bluntly.

Why don't you kill yourself? Why continue this life?

Well right now I certainly feel like killing myself.

I've struggled with suicidal tenancies since I was 12.  I'm not a person who is overly fond of himself in the first place. 

I think I need to take a xanax or something to calm down.

[Josietta]

Asking someone who has made it known on E multiple times that the have issues, why don't they kill themselves, whether its serious, in jest or otherwise is not cool.

The problem here is people continue to hammer the nails ino an already sealed box. You have your opinion and others have theirs. Lunar has made it clear that he is glad you have your beliefs and he has his but you keep badgering and pushing on what should have already been a closed matter.

For personal preservation I ask that this thread be locked NOW.

[Mithlomwen]

So why are you here? Honest question, meant in no way to offend or antagonize. I am seriously curious and perplexed, and I will ask bluntly.

Why don't you kill yourself? Why continue this life?

If you don't feel comfortable answering, I understand. But this is the logical conclusion of this discussion, and this question will be askee at some point. Choose not to answer, and we've reached the limit of what we can discuss.

Sabby.....really?  You know better than that. 

Since it seems this thread is spiraling downhill, it's time to lock it.