Hmm. My response was to JThunder’s claim that I thought that the other side couldn’t even claim to be right. Nothing is further from the truth, and I’d fight to the death to protect their right to claim they are correct. I’d even fight to preserve their right to claim they know they’re right. Where I draw the line is moving from statements into actions, unless they’ve got an ethical argument that does not depend on God saying something is wrong. (Unless they can produce their god, of course.)
That was my question to you. Are you against absolutists of any stripe trying to impose their absolutist beliefs on us? This is not a trick question - I’d be surprised if you disagreed. I’d be surprised if most of those who profess religion around here disagree.
That’s my dividing line. I’m for those who are against absolutism, no matter what their religious beliefs are, and against those in favor of it, again no matter what their religious beliefs are. My suspicion of most Western religions is that it can easily give cover for absolutism, since God is the ultimate Big Brother.
True, but what Communist Russia and China did was more akin to removing the Madonna and Christ from a church, replacing it with Jackson Pollock, and telling the people to pray to it. All of a sudden, Pollock’s art is now religious.
My original intent in starting this thread, IMHO, wasn’t to complain about Trihs being wrong. The thread was started to complain about Trihs being crass.
Put another way: I say “I believe there is a God”, and an atheist says, “I disagree; I believe there is no God, but I respect your feelings”, fine, I have no problem with that. I say “I believe there is a God”, someone like Der Trihs comes up and says, “You’re a moronic delusional idiot following a bunch of pedophilic con-men spewing fairy-tale trash”, then I have a problem.
I don’t believe he exists, so don’t do it for me. My remark was a bit more targeted to comments along the lines of ‘religions are X’ or ‘religions do X’ and not backing it up nor responding when a counter example is shown. There’s very little that all religions have in common and lambasting religion for the crusades is rediculous.
I still feel like I don’t know the relevant fora well enough to comment on this. I don’t feel I can start railing against DT because I’d just be taking your word for it (not that I don’t trust you), but I don’t feel I can, well, I don’t want to say defend him, but keep doing what I’ve been doing.
I’ve misread (heh) you quite severely, then. I apologize.
No and yes. You can call it convenient; I call it two religions with more similarities than differences. Tomato, tomahto.
If Falwell teaches tolerance and forgiveness for all, and then that “God hates fags” and is taking vengeance upon the United States for our tolerance of them, I feel I must dismiss both as it’s rather difficult to figure out which one he’s really about. DT at least seems consistent. I’ll concede, though, that I know the works of both mostly by having stumbled upon them while focused on other things, and I mean, I don’t follow either one of them. There could be things about both I don’t know. From what I’ve seen, Falwell and Robertson are all about vitriol and bloody justice for perceived wrongs. Put another way, if you compare the apparent viewpoints of Falwell/Robertson vs. Der Trihs, Falwell/Robertson’s beliefs appear (to me, at least) to be full of ridiculous delusions with no foundation in truth whatsoever while I see DT’s as being the extreme, overdone manifestations of what started out as logical observations.
No. For something to be a religion, it MUST force people to make more significant dedications/changes in their lives than reading the NBA page in the sports section, buying shoes, or acknowledging a great scientific mind.
Neither do I. I hope Dopers start to actually read my posts and realize I’ve never equated communism itself to religion, before my viewpoint becomes a cliche here.
And when was the last time an atheist said “You do know there’s no God, right?” to you in a debate? Stop taking things so literally.
I’ll grant you that. Never said anything to the contrary, in fact.
It’s what I thought was a funny response to the quoted passage. As much as I’ve said in his favor, Der Trihs reminds me more of zealotous assholes I know who follow Abrahamic religions than those who claim atheism/agnosticism.
Heh, good point. I have nothing to say to this.
I’ll buy that. I’m starting to get a feeling that I’m delving into waters I’m not familiar enough with, and also as though I’m a pawn in a game where the subject of the pitting won’t show up and defend himself. I think I’ve been won over.
I don’t know if you’re ranting about me here, but that belief has been attributed to me by others and I’ve never espoused it myself, nor do I hold it privately.
Do you really feel that Stalinism was only a socio-economic theory? You don’t feel there was any element of faith or belief in Stalin/Lenin/etc.'s quest for your greater good? You don’t feel anyone had to put faith into the idea that Stalin just killed some otherwise innocent person because he was going to poison the believers with his disbelief? That’s how I see that nation, and I see Nazi Germany the same way even though the underlying economic theory is different.
Anti-Elephantist: (politely) You know there’s no pink elephants in pajamas, don’t you?
Elephantist: Of course there are!
A-e: Have you ever seen one?
Elephantist: Of course not? What kind of question is that? The Pink Elephant in Pajamas isn’t a physical being like you or I.
A-e: So you admit there’s no such thing as a pink elephant in pajamas?
Elephantist: That’s not what I said–I said it’s not a physical being. It doesn’t physically exist like grey elephants; its existence is more similar to a concept or a feelings existence then it is to a person’s existence.
A-e: People who believe in Pink Elephants in Pajamas are the root of all evil; they are scabs upon humanity and all great evils that mankind has perpetuated have been done in the name of Pink Elephants in Pajamas.
Elephantist: Communists didn’t belive in Pink Elephants, but they still did evil things.
A-e: Communists were Pink Elephants in Pajamas!
Elephantist: No they weren’t Communism is a political ideology and Pink Elephants in Pajamas are supernatural beings. They’re fundamentally different.
A-e: RELIGION IS FOR TEH SUXXORZ!!! OMG!! UR A CONFRIMIST!!! I"M SO MORE INTELGENT TEHN U!
I’ve never liked the allegory of invisible pink unicorns, or whatever else, as an analogy for God. I’ve always thought of that as a straw man (or possibly one of those other logical fallacies).
And I considered pitting Der Trihs, but now I’m glad I didn’t. I think a lot of you guys and girls have done a better job than I would have.
Many of the worst political movements in human history have been irreligious, they were also very irrational. That’s about the only parallel I can draw between religion and communism, they are both irrational. They both grasp on to dogma, and put very little emphasis on critical thinking.
Ah, feeble joke makes subtle point. If a god existed, this sort of thing should happen. I’d think that a kid without exposure to religion x growing up in a household of religion suddenly spouting the dogma of religion x would be powerful evidence for it. Don’t recall it ever happening, though.
Well, the analogy is not quite the IPU for God, it is more how belief in the IPU without evidence (absurd on the face of it) is similar to the belief in God without solid evidence. A lot of it is to say to theists that if they examine their lack of belief in the IPU, they will understand our lack of belief in God. That invisible pinkness can be used as an analogy to the non-understandability of god is just the cherry on top.
Or perhaps God isn’t big on dogma? I’ve wondered if the succession of prophets was a failing attempt to get a simple message through and get away from dogma. If we, for the sake of argument, assume that God exists, then at most it seems that only one sect is on the right path so obviously humans are doing human things with a superhuman experience. Just like everything else, it’s people trying to get what they want out of something than the thing itself that produces bad results.
“You know there’s no God, right?” is a better representation of the average atheist position than “I believe because my parents and the President do” is of the average theist position. That’s all I wanted to emphasize.
Being an atheist, I may be misinterpreting what I see, or not seeing all of it–but the way I see it, most religious people believe because they were told to by their parents. I wouldn’t say the President has anything to do with it, but our culture does* and maybe the President is a symbol of that. That said, I see where you’re coming from, as few believers would outright say “I believe because my parents and the people around me believe” (even though it’s usually true, and often true even for atheists) while one can more feasibly imagine an atheist actually saying “You know there’s no God, right?” in a debate. Well, honestly, logically there isn’t. But if there’s anything I’ve learned from this thread, it’s that saying so, plain out, doesn’t get you anywhere.
Our culture also emphasizes the virtues of atheism in various ways, too. It’s obviously not a one-way street.
Voyager, take off your blinders for a moment and listen.
I’m a little old retired Southern school teacher who gets together with eleven other retired teachers and school board members once a month. Several in the group are pretty active in various church groups as volunteers. There may be a couple of us who weren’t teachers.
To the best of my knowledge, there is not a soul in the group who is opposed to gay rights or women’s rights. We would be horrified at the thought of murdering anyone including a doctor who performs abortions. We understand the concept of separation of church and state and don’t see a conspiracy to undermine our annual Christmas party. Some of us curse like demons, but still believe in the power of prayer.
Personally, I am probably a Christian because I grew up in a Christian household. For that I am grateful. Through my father’s open-mindedness and a series of coincidences and experiences, I grew to be open to other ways of thinking and other beliefs. For that I am also grateful. The “God” that I believe in is probably not the God that you think that I believe in. No one is shut out of anything because we are all basically the same thing. That is what I believe more than anything.
Here at SDMB, I would hope that intelligent Dopers would not make me a “victim” of the various labels that fit me (Christian, teacher, Southerner, old woman) but which are loaded because of ignorance or bigotry.
