(bolding mine)
That’s right, it doesn’t matter how quietly you do something stupid, it’s still stupid. Same with evil things. Doing them quietly doesn’t make them any better.
He’s mine too. All of those claiming religion isn’t harmless, it is too me. Witness the Maine vote on SSM. That vote directly reflects the effects of religion on me. Not a big deal, right? Doesn’t affect you. It doesn’t affect Der Trihs either. And yet he is more vocal than I, more indignant, and always responds rationally.
True. I was going to make the following post in response to Princhester earlier in the thread, but i left for work and forgot about it.
My attitude towards religion has changed somewhat since i’ve lived in the United States. My atheism is just the same as it ever was, but i have become more conscious of the active ways in which religious irrationality can have negative social and cultural consequences.
Australia is a remarkably secular place, particularly by American standards, and even the few people i knew who actually attended church seemed to do so more out of habit and a general feeling that it was the right thing to do. You can go for long periods in Australia, or at least you could when i lived there, without religion impinging on your day-to-day life in any way that might be likely to affect you.
There is very little sense, for most non-believing Australians, that religion in general presents much of a threat to their institutions and freedoms (i recognize that some of this has changed since i left, especially regarding anti-Muslim sentiment among some groups, but as you note that’s more about race and xenophobia than religion per se). Even as an atheist, in Australia i never felt any sense of encroachment from religion, and thus entertained no hostility or animosity towards its practitioners. They were, with the exception of a few people like Fred Nile, just folks who spent their Sundays differently from me.
Here in the United States, religion is much more of a “live” issue in so many areas of broader political significance, in ways that often seem threatening to the continued separation of church and state, that those of us without belief can sometimes become more hostile to religion in general, and less tolerant of its believers, at least in generic ways like making broad statements about religious irrationality. While i’m a firm believer in religious freedom, and have no desire to remove from anyone their right to practice their religion, i am more likely than i was before to adopt an openly critical and hostile tone to expressions of religion, particularly when those expressions are connected with policy positions that have detrimental consequences for others. You want to believe in a sky fairy? Fine, i’ve got no problem with that. But when you start saying that your sky fairy view of the world should be taught alongside actual science in school science classes, then i will have no hesitation in telling you to go fuck yourself, and pointing out the irrationality and the stupidity of your beliefs.
Ditto, and I’ve been meaning to say that publicly for a while. He shows no more hatred than others do for political policies that they find dangerous, unfair, etc. I don’t recall seeing anyone pitted for their level of hatred for political policies they find abhorrent, yet Der Trihs regularly gets pitted for not tip towing around religion and voicing his opinion bluntly- as he should. I’m sure it’s because we’ve all grown up being told we’re supposed to have respect for religion and it’s somehow improper to criticize religious beliefs. That, and people aren’t used to hearing such good arguments for why their beliefs are ridiculous, irrational, etc.
I’d contribute more to religious debates if I was as good at it as Der Trihs is. Keep up the good fight, Der Trihs! I’d bet that you do get through to a lot of posters and lurkers that never heard arguments for religion get destroyed so well before.
Joe: “Everything that man is saying is logical and rational!”
Susie: “Yeah, but his attitude… it’s like… ick. Such a turn-off!”
**Joe: ** “You know you have a good point. It IS a turn-off. Fuck logic and rationality, let’s follow that herd of pleasant and cordial myth-believers. They may be irrational and delusional, but at least they’re nice!”
Susie: “Yeah. Sky-Fairy Tales are such a turn-on!”
Science and logic aren’t popularity contests. How can someone be “turned off” from rationality? If Stalin had formulated Relativity instead of Einstein, **E **would still equal **MC **fucking squared!
You don’t need to be his best buddy or even like him. But this idea that because DT can be extreme in his presentation, that somehow magically makes religionists positions have any merit whatsoever is just, well, irrational.
I see what you mean, and I agree that you catch more people with honey than vinegar. But what sets SOME people apart from flies is that we are curious enough about the truth that we’ll stomach it no matter if it is sweet or bitter. For everyone else there’s American Gladiators and organized religion.
As you would probably agree–even if everyone shushes the finger-pointing kid, the Emperor STILL has no Clothes. His Clothes don’t just magically appear because we all agree to be polite.
Besides–this is the SDMB-- not some black-tie Inaugural Ball. We don’t gather here to compare charm school diplomas, we fight ignorance here. If there’s any place to tell it like it is, it is here.
So has this turned into the Der Trihs is awesome thread? Sweet.
But “agnosticism” is a loaded word because it is usually used in terms of religious belief. If you are using “empirical agnosticism” in the above quote as I think you are–i.e. starting from a neutral point and then proceeding empirically-- then atheism is still the logical default. Just as non-belief in zombies or fairies is the logical default.
That’s probably because the American religionists are so much more “in your face” then their Australian or Kiwi counterparts, and because the stakes are much higher here. In the USA, public policy falls prey to the inappropriate and destructive influence of religion far more than it does Down Under.
I don’t care for religion myself but Der Trihs is an asshole for making broad, absolute statements about whole swaths of people (eg. that all religious people are stupid and evil). It’s about as reasonable as saying that anyone that is over 18 and has over $50,000 to their name is stupid and evil for choosing to live in the United States.
Religion may deserve to be hated, but Der Trihs goes past hating religion and hates the people that believe in it.
If you further something that is evil and hated, should you be hated too?
That’s all very true. But I’ve had more than a few American colleagues here at Uni who start to talk about how Jesus is awesome (or how religion is a con) and have to be told (politely and in a friendly way) “Mate, nobody cares. Seriously.”
Perhaps, depending on how you are furthering it and how evil it actually is. To suggest that a hermit buddhist monk is as evil as the guy running the Spanish Inquisition is absurd, but Der Trihs doesn’t make that distinction.
I think it’s too simplistic to just group all “religion” together and feel that it should be all abolished equally. It is possible to be religious and still be benign to other people - such people should not be demonized alongside the religious people who cause others harm. Plus, it is possible to hate one aspect of someone without assuming that the one aspect dominates every decision that they ever make. Do you hate Thomas Jefferson because he owned slaves?
Hate hurts the hater more than the hatee.
Der Trihs is free to hate religion and the religious with as much passion as he can muster, it no longer bothers me. I still think he’s horribly ignorant with the broad generalizations he makes about anyone who is even the least bit spiritual. But hey, if he likes a binary world where everything is either black or white, who am I to judge?
My sig seems very appropriate here.
So, because you can’t be sure they don’t exist, it’s best to err on the safe side and act on the assumption that God, Zeus, Odin, Ra, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, fairies, leprechauns, unicorns, vampires… exist.
No?
Perhaps a better policy is to not believe that something exists until there is evidence that it does exist. In which case atheism and your agnosticism mean the same thing.
It’s like Schrodinger’s Religion- if the cat is neither dead/alive does it comes out of the cave in three days?
We have Curtis who claims to be a 14 year old kid, completely programmed into religion before he ever had a chance to learn to think for himself. The kid is depressing and I feel sorry for him. Religious teaching have the poor kid so up tight and tied in knots, that I hate to read his posts.
I thought the bit about killing most of the animals and zooing the rest was a bit weird, but other than that I think he’s okay. A touch bitter, but considering my attitude towards those who try to tell me it’s okay to torture people because 911!!! or that reports coming from James Inhofe’s office have the same clout as years of peer-reviewed research that all points in the same direction, and considering the fact that he has to live among such buffoons whereas I just sits and watches and can turn it off at any time, I can understand why an American might be less than impressed with his fellow countrymen.
Although personally my impression of Americans through my limited travel to the States is pretty darned good.
Is anyone saying this? I think you and others are having a good, heartening, make-yourself-feel-better slug at nobody here.
Ignorance sees **Der Trihs **coming from across the plain, doesn’t like the look of him, and closes the castle gates. He slashes to pieces any of the tiny minority of the inhabitants of Ignorance who are silly enough to come outside the walls despite his presence. **Der Trihs **feels great, we all love his swordplay and cheer at the righteousness of his fighting. Inside the castle the Ignorant multitudes go about their business untroubled by anything **Der Trihs **does or says.
Meanwhile others walk quietly up to the door, are let in, and teach the inhabitants a thing or two.
Who is better at fighting Ignorance?
And are completely ignored because the inhabitants have been carefully raised to ignore anything that contradicts the dogma they’ve been raised with. And they are constantly being told over and over that the favored dogma is The Truth.
And if they actually DO pay attention to those “quiet teachers” - they react exactly as if the teachers had barged in waving a sword with a child impaled on it.