Perhaps you could provide a link to that. I haven’t read the whole thread but I sure didn’t see anything like that. Unfortunately rigid shrieking fundies give all believers a black eye. They are at least part of the reason I decided to of reject the name Christian. Still, it should be obvious that they are far from the whole picture.
All you Christians help out and raise your hands!!
What, Cunt? I’m not following you? Maybe I wasn’t clear, this is MY personal protest. It makes ME feel good. THAT IS the point. As I said, rude, dumb cunts (of which you are definitely one) get way to much latitude on these boards, so I falls to me (I guess) to pick up the slack. One question that comes to mind, sis, is: do you think you’re more of the dumb kind of dumb cunt or the cuntier kind of dumb cunt? Also, are you more of the puss-oozing syphillated strain, or the dried-up crusty kind? Oh, and are you malodorous? Do cats scamper to your feet like they would to a fishmonger?
Please, do tell. All this information will help me with my Personal Protest Against Dumb Cuntery. Or do you think that should be personal protest against dumb cuntery? Given you’ve been involved in your own personal protest longer than I, I’m intrigued to see what someone more experienced would say.
Mmmm… I’ve read three pages or so of this shitstorm, and just Wow.
I’m an atheist who has not ruled out the possibility of a higher power. I choose to call myself atheist instead of agnostic because while I’m always open-minded about the possibility, my life appears quite devoid of any sort of god and no amount of me wishing that weren’t so is going to change the fact that I really don’t believe.
I use ‘‘god’’ with a little ‘g’ in most cases not out of a sense of irreverence but out of a sense of confusion and to make a clear delineation between who God was to me when I was a kid and who god is to me now. god is a question mark in my life, this is therefore my generic term for ‘‘higher power,’’ a helluva lot easier than writing God/god/gods every time I post. If we’re talking about the Christian God well obviously that’s a ‘‘big-G’’ god, God as Christians know Him, just as Zeus is Zeus and Lord Buddha is Lord Buddha.
I would be really sorry to offend anyone by referring to god with a little ‘‘g’’ but I would probably have to keep doing it because in my mind, God and god are two completely different concepts.
I wouldn’t dream of not capitalizing the name of Jesus Christ no matter what my feelings were about him (actually quite an inspiring dude to be honest) and it’s hard for me to read that as anything other than deliberately offensive. However, I respect the concept of this kind of personal protest at the same time. There is a person who was once a part of my life whose proper name I will never capitalize and that is symbolic of the power that person once had and no longer has. But that was a human being who hurt me directly and it’s actually a kind of secret that I do it – I would be slow to point out that deliberate non-capitalization to anyone and would just let them assume I just missed the Shift key.
So to not capitalize Jesus Christ with the deliberate attempt to annoy – it’s hard for me to wrap my head around. And while the person doing it might think they’re being mildly irritating, I could see how it would be very offensive on the receiving end and interpreted as openly hostile. So while I am of course entitled to refer to Jesus any way I choose, I’m not sure I’d be too surprised to receive some hostile reactions in return.
I’m also wondering Kalhoun where the hell you live that you get such repeated discrimination for being an atheist? (Not doubting the veracity of this claim, just curious.) I can recall a few awkward proselytizing moments but nothing particularly traumatic or enraging. I actually get way more shit for being a Buddhist than an atheist. Overwhelmingly the Christians I run into are more concerned about me worshiping other gods (like the moon god that Buddhists apparently worship 
) than me worshiping no god at all. But I usually don’t discuss religion in public places so it usually only comes up when people ask about my tattoo. I live in the Midwest.
Oh and Omegaman, your happy posts are a joy to read. You’re all about the best thing that Christianity can be.
Maybe…but a lot of people are quite certain there’s a hereafter. It is quite often stated as the prime motivator for what they do. Actual death of the body is just a step for them.
I know very few people that came to belief in the supernatural on their own. Some have changed religions over the years, but most had the seed planted at infancy.
Yes, thought, curiosity and wonder are present in all higher life forms. I don’t think those characteristics don’t often translate to a religious interpretation without a push.
Would that include the poster that immediately followed your post? 
And that’s how you teach someone to respect the viewpoints of others.
Hey, I’m trying it all. I’ve rarely encountered a cranium of such impenetrable density. And she has made it perfectly clear that she refuses to show respect for a large number of people. And offered the most asinine explanation. Check out the exchange from the beginning. I can’t help it she is so resistant to reason. Or that I have such range. It’s a blessing and a curse.
Now, why don’t you put your mod hat on and scold the troll. —Oh, a chant for my protests up and down the street…a call for one and all, mods and non-mods, to “Scold the Troll”…
This was already touched on, but the point I think needs to be emphasized that if people are taught beliefs from a young age, they become accepted until a point when self-questioning takes place. I think that to a certain extent, almost everyone goes through some sort of self-evaluation at some point in their lives. The thing I’m not so sure about is how deep that evaluation goes or how often it happens.
Thus, we have people growing up to believe the tenets of their religion, and some percentage, possibly a large or majority percentage, never ends up changing their moral beliefs to anything besides what they were taught as children. Wouldn’t it be better then, to either teach more liberal ideas from the onset, or let people make up their own minds? At least let them be absent of a huge overarching doctrine. Everyone is going to get some of their morality from how they were raised, and no one can expect everyone to have the same or even similar codes of morality. But without a massive entity dictating what everyone should do, things would be very different.
In short, and with a broader brush: it’s easy to get kids to believe whatever you want them to (eg gays are evil, abortion is murder, masturbation causes hairy palms and blindness). People grow up and are generally sheep, never questioning their core (ie learned-as-a-child) beliefs. Thus, it seems to be a bad thing to teach evil in black and white to children, such as religion does.
Dude, almost everyone offends tons of people. As has been ponited out, you offend Hindus by eating cows. You offend Muslims by not firebombing the Wikipedia servers that host the pictures of Muhammad. You offend femynysts by being a man. You offend North Korea and the People’s Repbulic by being white. And not communist. And living in freedom.
Is your argument seriously that people shouldn’t do what offends “a large number of people?”
Am I wrong in assuming you are here to defend the Christian side of the debate?
If your “Report this post to the Moderator” button is broken, please email us to have it fixed. Thank you, and have a pleasant day.
I think the hostility surrounding this is mind-bogglingly over the top. Now I know how people feel when some extremists want to kill them for naming a teddy bear “mohammed”. It’s like a switch flips in their heads and all sense of reason goes out the window.
Chicago area. Catholic Central. I never said any of it was traumatic; no one attacked me and beat me with a bible or anything. Some things have been minor; the co-worker who tacked a prayer to the stack of reports she delivered weekly. The account I worked on a couple years ago (a catholic hospital group) that led its vendors in prayer at the monthly meeting, the day camp leader that would bribe my son with Happy Meals behind my back and take him to church. The healthcare worker that could not finish her duties and pronounce my father in law dead until she prayed over him. Out loud.
But that’s really never what its been about. It’s about slipping these little things into the daily doings. School vouchers, the attempts to bring “intelligent design” into pubic schools, religious zealots harrassing women at clinics, pedophile priests being protected by the church, the senate prayer…all of it. Some people find these things acceptable. I don’t.
Yes, you are mistaken. Look at the OP heading. THAT is the debate. It might as well be a direct question to the dumb bitch, and have her stare back with lifeless, mindless eyes, saying, “but I want to protest”. If I’m arguing for any side it’s that side opposed to rude atheists.
You’re gonna need to type slower. He’s a little…off.
Maybe because your position is mind-boggingly rude and stupid. This has been explained to you more than once—and again after you asked, and you refused to engage. No surprise. Because you are more interested in holding on to your precious little cunty protest and insult an entire religion. And in the process, affording the status of the being it was built around to that of less than a man. And don’t be so fucking melodramatic. No one has threatened you with any physical harm. Casting your insults anonymously from afar makes it nice and safe. So, don’t you worry your pretty little cunty head about it.
I’d like to see some evidence for it being the prime mover. I know lot’s of folks believe in a hereafter and eternal reward, but I tend to think their day to day, moment to moment motives don’t revolve around that.
I’d say the seed is planted simply by being on our society and that can’t be avoided. I never went to church as a kid. We never prayed or talked about God and Jesus except at Christmas and Easter and then it was a casual mention. I’d say I got the idea that God and Jesus were real and somehow related without knowing any details. Certainly god belief and what flavor is heavily influenced by culture. Still, believers become non believers and non believers become believers. My own beliefs went from a vague concept about God, to Christianity, to whatever independent form of believer I am now. That’s how society evolves. I’m not sure it says anything at all about the value of anything in particular.
You may be right. The question may be is that push internal or external? I do get your drift though. Is it also possible that atheists are pushed away from religion?
Eh? Which poster whose name starts with a K and lives in Australia am I confusing you with? Or did you move?
OK… STFU… is that scolding enough?
You must have missed it this first time, but I’ll take you through it again. I really don’t give a fuck what you have to say on this subject. Go lap at your fellow atheist’s cunt.
Well, it scared the hell out of all my friends when we were young. Now, if they’ve let go of that piece of the indoctrination as adults, I would certainly understand it.
Yes, I’m sure some people come to it on their own, but like I said…most need a push. I was raised atheist. I was encouraged to attend church and temple with my friends when I became curious about the whole thing. It was never forbidden; not even discouraged. My folks were all about free inquiry.