Willing ourselves to change beliefs?

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If I understand correctly, one reason that racial hate speech is not allowed at the SDMB is that no one can choose what race they are. Those with various religious beliefs can be condemned by other Dopers because being religious is a choice.

Although some people do make religious choices – either to become atheists or believers – I believe that there are people who could not choose just by trying. They can’t choose to believe or disbelieve based on sheer will power.

The bashing of Christians more than most other religions seems to be an obsession with some posters. They insist on using “all Christians” or “all atheists” when they say that these groups are stupic, arrogant, killers, harmful, and intolerant, etc.

That is a ridiculous premise no matter which side is being hounded. Such statements are based in either ignorance or hate. When someone becomes obsessed with bashing, she or he is being a jerk.

I understand why debating religious topics is fine. But all inclusive comments about any large group of people – over and over again, ad nauseum, is jerkish, is it not? Those comments cannot be true based simply on the diversity within the groups.

The word “some” would be more accurate if zealots on either side must compulsively rave.

I don’t think I’ve ever, in my adult life, put down anyone for being an atheist. I don’t try to “convert” anyone. I even sent a Christmas card to an atheist pal. It showed a little market out in the desert. The sign above it said, “Cheeses of Nazareth.”

I do have plenty to say about some religious fundamentalists and an occasional atheist if they, too, are overbearing. I practice tolerance toward most beliefs. I do not tolerate a lack of integrity very well.

Can Dopers be cautioned to be a little more insightful and less hateful when they are about to make hostile generalities? (No living Christians participated in the Inquisition, for example. So why bring that up again and again to put down contemporary Christians?) I hear hostile generalities made in my neighborhood about those who embrace the Islamic faith. I wouldn’t want to see those comments posted here.

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  1. Just an observation, not entirely on topic:
    Part of the complexity is the fundamentalists have taken over the Christian brand with some success, to the bafflement of mainline Christians. Many of the attacks on Christianity on this board are better understood as attacks on fundamentalist Christianity.

  2. Eventually Zoe will be asked to link to examples. I’ll note that the recommendation she gave in the final paragraph was reasonably mild, though certainly not de minimus.

  3. ETA: Dang there are 22 threads on the first ATMB page. The place is hopping! :smiley:

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That perception is easy enough to explain. On an English-speaking, mostly American board, that and to a lesser degree Islam are the religions most people are going to encounter directly or in the media and have problems with. And if they aren’t a fan of the religion in question, Christianity is the religion that they probably are going to feel needs tearing down the most, since Islam gets more than enough bashing while Christianity gets a huge amount of public respect and adulation.

Most hostility to religion is reactive, and there’s a lot more Christianity to react to in the places where most of the posters on this board live.

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No living Christians participated in American chattel slavery either. But those who were there certainly publicly justified it using their religious beliefs. And down into my lifetime, similar sets of Christians similarly defended Jim Crow laws and the ban of interracial marriage on those same religious beliefs. Where do I draw that line?

Yes, I agree that blanket condemnation of groups is probably unjust and wrong. Probably. What about Creationists? Or Birthers? Or anti-vaxers? Or add in your favorite target here. The public actions of people who claim, loudly, to represent that group can’t help but be the focus of thinking about that group. It’s simply too convoluted in any but the most formal and technical of situations to say “Creationists are generally speaking idiots, at least Duane Gish and the writings of the Institute of Creation Research are and I looked at Conservapedia and found the same silly beliefs there and they exist on other sites and in YouTube videos but I certainly can’t know what every single individual who answers a survey question with a Creationist viewpoint might actually be thinking when he or she is brought to that point.”

As for religion, I know people who left their religion to become atheists or agnostics. I know people who have converted to a major religion. I know people who ascribe to a general spirituality. I know people who moved from one Protestant sect to another. It is totally ludicrous to say religion is not a choice. Nobody has ever in all history been born with a religion. It is imparted by your upbringing and your culture. No two Christians* have the same set of all possible principles and beliefs and tenets toward every possible moral question. Your acts as a Christian are totally and entirely within your control. If a sufficient number of Christians forget that this individuality exists and make blanket statements or pass laws or do hateful or hurtful things, then they can and should be condemned for them as a group, even if they don’t represent every Christian in existence or have disagreements among themselves. If people can’t do that, then you are saying that they can’t make general statements at all, ever, about anything. But that’s simply not the way human discourse works.
*Substitute any faith, creed, sect, or spiritual movement for Christians as needed.

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Your thread title makes it look like you wanted this to be a Great Debates thread. I don’t think ATMB is the place for a big debate about the extent to which people choose their religious beliefs or affiliations.

If you’re arguing that individual Dopers should resist the temptation to utter hostile generalizations about large groups of people (including but not limited to Christians), I agree—among other things, because it makes the people who do so look silly. If you’re arguing that there should be enforceable board policies against such utterances, I’m inclined to err on the side of permissiveness, and trust that obvious jerkishness/trolling will be obvious. I’d think Christians in particular would have a reason not to be too thin-skinned.
[QUOTE=Jesus]
Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
[/QUOTE]

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Anti-Chistianity is the new misogyny.

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I see we’re stretching the definition of “persecution” again.