This small form of protest that Kalhoun has adopted has really gotten people pissed off. I bet if she were writing a scholarly paper about JC she would properly cap his name. But to try to remove some of the power or sway or whatever you want to call it caused by invoking his name, even in a non-religious discussion about him, should be her choice. You might see it as childish, but if it really bothers you that much then maybe you should refuse to engage her. Just the fact that it bothers you should indicate that it’s at least having some of the effect that she intended; protests are used to call attention to an issue.
What if it were another man? What if my grandmother were killed at Auschwitz, and I refused to capitalize hitler? In a scholarly paper I probably would, because that’s not where I would choose to protest, but I might be using it as a way to deal with my own feelings on the issue. You might call me childish or an attention-seeker (“Look at me! My grandmother was killed by a mass-murderer!”), but it would really be not sweat off my ass.
The argument could be made that Jesus has caused more death than Hitler (which would be unfortunate, what with his whole stance of loving people. That’s really the problem I have with xtnt [does that bother you? I got used to writing Christianity that way in my notes because writing the word over and over was really annoying, so I began abbreviating it that way], at least from Jesus’ teachings, is largely about loving everyone), and even if you see the man himself as blameless, I’m not going to criticize someone for protesting the power that JC has in the world these days in some small way.
Might I direct you to something that should be cited much more often on the dope?
ETA: PS, my brother once referred to Jesus and the disciples, in a final art history class paper, as “JC and the boys.”
I’m going to have to go ahead and say, yeah, mmmmm, do whatever you want. I know your heart, it’s good!
Those who wan’t you to pay The Man respect don’t know The Man!
He washed people’s feet!! Does that sound like the kind of man that would make you bow down before Him?
That dude is my ABSOLUTE “FREAKIN” HERO!!
Superman? BITCH. Batman,? BITCH
I don’t care what you believe. I believe I have love for you!
Guess who showed it to me?
I know since you don’t know Him this is making absolute zero sense to you, but be sure those who really know Him look at others and see their struggles, their ugliness, their innermost beauty and say “Could I walk a mile in your shoes?”
I’m not going to lie,…sometimes it’s reeaaallly fucking hard to see it, but you have but to look, with the eyes of a child, to see the truth of all that happens in the world. Both good and bad.
Keep walking. With your head on straight. With purpose.
He is right there. When your getting ready to burn it all. He is there.
I’ve always found atheists to be full of contempt for people of faith rather than the faith itself. Atheists usually have the, “I’m right, you’re wrong and that’s that” mentality. I’ve never really met an open minded one. lol I mean, Christians are the same way, but aren’t hateful in doing so. No offense to anyone, that’s just the way I’ve seen it on message boards throughout the years.
I think it’s not as simple as you’re trying to make it sound. For instance, I think I’m a decent person. Even a good person. I certainly don’t need a church to tell me not to kill and rape and so forth. However, I don’t tend to do as much volunteering and charity stuff as I think I should. I mean, I do some. But I could do more. And should do more. If I had precisely the same morals and ethics as I do, but belonged to and believed in and frequently attended a church, I would probably do more such things simply because of the availability/peer pressure/communality of it.
And, for that matter, if one were to be very cynical, there might be people in the world who really are NOT good, who would NOT ever give to charity at all, except that they are more-or-less pressured into doing so by their church. The recipient of that charity is just as fed/clothed as they would be by freely given charity from spontaneously morally good people.
My point is not religion=good or religion=bad, because of course the same thing might happen in reverse (people who would otherwise not be evil convinced to do evil things by their churches), it’s just that Kalhoun’s claim that any good that appeared to come from religion would have existed anyhow without religion was (imho) incorrect and unsupported.
Would the world be better or worse if religion had never existed? That question can’t possibly be answered.
She? Fine. How can you say she isn’t? She admitted doing it to irk people. People she supposedly wants to have a civil discussion with. And just because YOU weren’t offended, doesn’t mean that her punk bitch tactic is not offensive to many. I find it offensive, not even so much on religious ground, but on the grounds of stupidty, childishness, and petulance. Oh, and douchebagness.
I think it’s childish too, but hey, sometimes people are childish. Turn the other cheek, and all that. Just because someone’s trying to be offensive doesn’t give a get-out-of-jail-free card for being irksome back. The best argument to show it up as being silly is to simply let it continue.
Its fascinating to me that so many militant atheists are willing to believe -without proof - the untestable hypothesis that the world would be a better place without religion.
Right, because there certainly aren’t any countries with a majority non-religious population that we can use as a model. We certainly can’t compare statistics between them and very religious countries. And there’s simply no way we can draw a link between some kinds of behavior and religion. Nope, good job catching that.
I’m not hopeful, but let’s give it a go. No one is asking you to go one iota out of your way for their religious belief. And neither party in a discussion need go one iota out of there way to intentionally piss off the other person in a discussion they supposedly want to have. Yet, you go out of your way and deviate from the convention of capitalizing a man’s name. A convention you yourself follow with people both real and imaginary. One would think that if you were interested in engaging with them, that you would not go out of your way to deviate from the norm and intentionally irk them. The very thing you admit to doing. Can you not see how that is rude? How it might be counter-productive to the type of discussion you say you want to have? How it might make you look like a douchebag?
You seek shelter from all this because “but I’m just protesting”. Newsflash, : you will be judged on your actions. Or are you one of these hopeless little platitude-filled “oh, people shouldn’t judge other people” nitwits? And your actions matter even more when they effect others. And when you intentionally go out of your way to irk someone else—never mind someone who you supposedly want to have a civil discussion with—you will be judged accordingly.
So many militant athiests? Cite? The SDMB is (it is often said) heavily atheistic. How many SDMB members can you find who will state not only that they believe the above to be true, but that they are 100% beyond all doubt certain of the above sentiment? Heck, I’m an atheist and would probably, if I had to be either pro- or anti- organized religion, come down anti-, and that doesn’t mean I know the world would be better off without it entirely. It’s like the old kill-Hitler-and-someone-worse-might-be-there-instead thing. (And now I’ve compared organized religion, as a whole, to Hitler. Well done, Max… good job of shoring up your “rational non-hateful atheist” cred )
Although there are two very different questions… “how would the world be if religion had never existed”; and “would the world we have today become better or worse if religion withered and died”. The first one (to which I was referring) is way way way unanswerable. The second one seems like something that can at least be discussed, as you can try to compare various statistics and facts about countries where religion has increased vs decreased in popularity and influence, but I don’t see such an argument being either definitive or particularly likely to persuade.
I’ve heard very few atheists say this. Certainly far fewer than I’ve heard religious people saying the world would be better if everyone believed as they do.
I disagree with this too. It’s easily observable that people with no belief are capable of the same amount of “good” as any believer.
I would aslo point out that religion and “good” are both human constructs, so the statement that “good comes from religion” is really only a statement that good comes from humans. Knowledge of “good” actually has to precede religion, even in religious thought.
To further comment on Dangerosa’s comment, I know of exactly one atheist here whom I know would reliably make that claim. You know who I’m talking about. (Now, folks have expressed support of his views in previous thread, but that does not mean that they’d agree with him on that particular point.
(Granted, this was asked five years ago - MAN, was it really that long? - but I don’t think it’s a good argument that the demographics of the board changed that dramatically.)
I’ve stated on this board that it was time for religion to exit stage right.
I just don’t make a point of saying it over and over, and thus it’s not what I’m primarily known for on this board (assuming I’m primarily known for anything in particular).
It think you’ve got quite a bit of selection bias in your sample. Many of us don’t care if religious people are religious, and thus don’t bother arguing about religion on message boards. The ones who do are the ones who are also likely to have negative opinions (since they’re, you know, atheists).
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