In the fundamentalist mindset, that is exactly the case. Fundamentalists claim the Bible is inerrant and perfect. It is trivial to find absolute proof that the Bible is neither inerrant nor perfect. Therefore all fundamentalists are necessarily and without exception shitheads.
Right. I don’t have a problem with saying the fundamentalist, literalist mindset is wrong. I just don’t like it when atheists who have only that basic literalist interpretation use it to “disprove” Christianity as a whole.
There are legitimate angles to go with, like the lack of proof, certain theological problems with unsatisfying answers, concepts of rationality, and other such that can be brought up. But “I interpret the Bible this way, and that way doesn’t actually work, therefore Christianity is wrong.” As far as I’m concerned, they are just begging the question, since they will inherently by their own biases pick an interpretation that creates flaws.
And, yes, that does mean that Christians often do the opposite.
I think you need to accept that atheists don’t have a literalist interpretation of the bible any more than they have a literalist interpretation of “The Lord of the Rings”. If you don’t claim any of it is factually correct or that it sets out universal laws and dictats then no-one will be pushing back on what the words actually mean.
Show me a piece of writing that is purely fictional, decorative and for entertainment only and I’m going to enjoy it or not purely on aesthetic merits. Tell me that the same piece of writing is in fact some form of binding contract that should be used to govern the behaviour of humans and the rule of law then you can be absolutely sure that I’ll be scrutinising the small print.
You can’t escape the problem that, if you base your religion on the writings of the bible (and you do…) then what is written, what it says and what it means is massively important. If you say that the evidence for the truth of Christianity comes from the book (and it does, that is all there is) then if the book itself is riddled with errors, contradictions and outright fairy-tale you are going to have a hard time making the case.
Except that some of them do. The pi=3 claim requires a degree of literalism beyond that of the worst fundamentalist.
OK, well as I say, I think we differ on what it means to take the bible literally.
I for one am perfectly willing to admit that in the sport of taking potshots at christianity, sometimes atheists play on easy mode.
It doesn’t mean we can’t rip into other variants, but when echos of literalism show up (and have you seen the OP of this thread?), sometimes we just grab the giant hammers and start whacking the moles as they pop up. (Over and over and over…)
What about atheist fundamentalists?
I think you mean ideological fundamentalists who might also be atheists, seeing as the fundamental core of being an atheist entails not having a belief in god…and that’s it (and we’ve done this argument many times before)
Atheism can’t have fundamentalists, because the point of fundamentalism is having a strict set of beliefs. Atheism is one missing belief, and there’s nothing else attached to it.
There is no Fundamentalist Atheism because there is no published/written work that could set out the fundamentals to which one must adhere to be recognized as an atheist.
That said, there are definitely fundy atheists, (some posting on this board), where the word fundy has come to mean a judgmental person who takes his or her own beliefs and tries to impose them on the world with no possibility of legitimate discussion.
And that said, it should be noted that there are nearly as many views as there are people and any discussion that treats all atheists as if they were fundy atheists is as wrong (and stupid) as acting as though all fundamentalists are judgmental or all religious persons are fundamentalists.
Pick a specific person (Franklin Graham, Madalyn Murray O’Hair, whoever) and one can discuss the particular beliefs that person espoused. Making widespread declarations about members of groups and what they must believe is silly.
This is a good clarification, although fundy would still be short for fundamentalist, which atheists by definition apparently cannot be. But they can be enthusiastic or overzealous sometimes.
I think there’s no justification for accusing people of being overzealous or fundy or whatever, when all they’ve done “wrong” is insist on the only reasonable possibility that exists. Like a person who insists that there are no whole numbers smaller than 1.
There is also no justification for someone who feels compelled to pop everyone else’s balloons, like the person who tells a child there is no Santa long before they were ready to give up that particular belief.
I was never particularly comfortable with the Santa myth for my children. I said to my wife that if they ever asked if he was real I’d tell them the truth. As it happens, they never asked and one year merely stated as fact that he wasn’t. They still got presents and chocolate so they cared not one jot. I doubt that kids growing up without the Santa myth are in any way harmed by it.
To our kids the world continued just the same without the need for Santa and the “parent” explanation was much simpler than positing a supernatural being with magical powers and the ability to bestow gifts to the world who yet retained a capricious need to weigh up the worth of each child.
There may be a heavy-handed moral lurking in there somewhere I think.
I never told my son Santa was real. He sensed that other kids thought he was real but I don’t think he ever believed it.
If my kid tells your kid he’s not real, that’s your problem, not mine.
I never really believed in Santa as a kid. How could he got to all those places in the world in one night? When he showed up one evening in a Buick, I did start to doubt my doubts a little…
When my own kids asked if Santa was real, I said, “he’s as real as you and I.” Which was sort of telling the truth, actually.
Who are these people again? I can’t recall anyone seriously calling for belief in God to be made illegal - unlike religion which has historically made atheism illegal, and sometimes a capital offense. I suppose Communism is kind of like this, but I think it was more a case of a secular religion (with a definite holy book) trying to push out competing religions, not unknown in the history of Christianity.
No possibility of legitimate discussion? I don’t even understand this. Is that like not getting forced to pray in school? I know that there was a theoretical exemption, but my wife back before the court case was made to feel bad just for not going to church.
I might remind you that every atheist voter has voted for a believer, while the reverse is not true.
Santa or Joe Hill? 
For most, when a kid figures out that Santa isn’t real (and my kid did it logically) you say good job, don’t tell your friends.
When they figure out that God isn’t real most parents ship them off to Sunday School reeducation camp.
True dat. Nothing like a good rebirth!
There IS no possibility of legitimate discussion regarding the existence of a being who is called God, unless someone brings new evidence. There is no legitimacy to anyone’s belief in a being who is called God. In fact, they don’t believe it, and are merely engaging in self-deception.
If someone comes in saying “I have genuinely new evidence that God exists”, then of course I’m going to listen.