In particular, I am most interested in this little tidbit of apparently uneducated blather from a seemingly smart man:
While I am willing - perhaps - to give Ben the benefit of the doubt towards poor word choice, I would also like to send him a warm “fuck you, Ben!” for making such an ignorant comment and not catching it.
Atheistic evil? From Muslim extremists? Hmmm, maybe it’s me, but I think there’s a contradiction in there somewhere… amazing how the idiots of the world don’t seem to realize that it’s theistic belief that motivates this evil, drives it forward, all on the bullshit idea that there’s some reward on the other side of the rainbow for doing your particular brand of violent deity proud.
Oh well, it’s far too late for me to get terribly worked up over this - and I dare not try to rival MEBuckner’s brilliant rant in a similar vein. I just wanted to expose Ben Stein for the (a) idiot or (b) theistic bigot that he is.
No matter, his show sucked after Jimmy Kimmel left.
With Atheistic, Stein was commenting on how the teachings of the Islamic principles have been corrupted to fit one person’s world view.
Since There is no god but god, and Mohammed is his prophet, Osama’s teachings are against Allah, and therefore, in a manner of speaking, atheistic, if not Anti-theistic.
I hope the ticket you bought off the handle had a return-trip.
I’m only guessing that maybe his point was that regardless of these terrorists extremeism (sp?), they could have been further from what their religion’s message. Perhaps he was saying that the lack of respect for their god in their horrible actions was athiestic? Do you see where I’m trying to go with this?
You know, I could almost sorta kinda see this shit during the Cold War. I mean, at least the godless Commies really were atheists. But what the fuck is with this blaming atheists for what the God-fearing Qur’an-thumping Wahhabite Muslim theocrats do? It’s bad enough some dictionaries apparently define “atheist” to mean “one who has an absolutely 100% certain religious faith that there is no such thing as a god”; but some people apparently just use it to mean “anything we disagree with”.
Ben Stein is an…Anyone? Anyone?..idiot, who evidently has his head crammed up his…Anyone? Anyone?..ass, and who needs to be smacked upside the head with…a wet noodle or a two-by-four? Which, anyone?..A two-by-four. Osama bin Laden is or is not an atheist? Anyone know the answer?..Class?..Anyone?.. Not an atheist. Osama bin Laden is not an atheist.
Oh, come on, Manservant Hecubus. This is a classic example of the…anyone? anyone?..“no true Scotsman” fallacy.
Osama bin Laden is “atheistic”? Bullshit. If you want to argue his interpretation of Islam is corrupt, or not shared by the vast majority of Muslims, or sling this or that Qur’anic verse at him, go ahead. An atheist is one who has no belief in God–Osama bin Laden’s belief in God is profoundly fucked up; another way to put it is that “his God” is evil, but he’s not an “atheist”.
Geez, and I thought this was going to be a rant about how he jumps so glibly from eating shrimp at the Tap Room to “crying so much I could not see” to “Speaking of the final days…I had a nice dinner with my pal Wendy, a blond knockout, and my lifetime pal Carl Bernstein, at Trattoria dell’Arte.” Me and my gorgeous blond girlfriend and my good friend the famous writer at a trendy restaurant, where I had some DEEP THOUGHTS.
Ooh, that’s deep.
Then it’s back to the important stuff.
Twit.
Oops, then he realizes what he just said sounds twitty.
And some half-assed analysis.
And against my better judgement I’ve been clicking on the ----> “keep reading” arrows.
Then my recommendation to Mr. Stein would be to make his meaning clear. If Mr. Stein said such as you claim, I’d be happy to read it - a clarification on his part in certainly in order. If you read what I wrote, you’ll quite clearly see I said I might consider it poor word choice. Regardless, “atheistic” is not the proper word to describe the beliefs or motivations of those involved if they think they are serving a deity - is it?
Er, no, they might be contrary to the wider interpretation of Islamic teaching, but certainly not atheistic.
And I hope you learn what atheism and, hence, atheistic mean.
First, there is no God but God, and Mohammed is his prophet. Get that straight, Jughead. The Koran is kind of a “You’re with me, or you’re agi’n me.” type thing.
Here are your errors in judgement.
First: Let me remind you of the “let’s define words” camp that there are alternate definitions of atheism, one of which is “IMMORALITY”. It is convenient how you left that out of your diatribe. Now, if you want to split hairs, and nitpick words, make sure you know what the hell you’re talking about. Your first error is IGNORANCE, and by the way you’re crowing about it, it must be absolute fucking bliss.
Second: You seem to have misunderstood what you were trying to say. Piss out some vinegar, sit on an ice cube, I don’t give a fuck. Your second error is acting like a DUMBASS. Just don’t be a dumbass. I’ll call you on it, and I’ll call you on it every time.
Third: Read what I said. THINK about it. If THAT means you have to pull your head out of the sand and spit mud for a week or two, so be it. You’re dealing with minds greater than your own here, though, so I don’t expect you to rise to the challenge. Your third error is that you did not THINK BEFORE YOU SPOKE.
Four: Don’t get me started. I’ll pick you to pieces, and I’ll like doing it. Your fourth error is GETTING IN A GUNFIGHT WITH A KNIFE.
As for me, I’ll have a beer. And, I’ll think you’re a fool with pigjizz for brains for the rest of my life. And I’ll be right.
Well, dictionary.com doesn’t support Manservant’s definition of atheistic.
I agree with the OP. Real bad word choice.
If not for a belief in God and an afterlife, they wouldn’t have killed themselves and 6000 others in His “service.”
And, here I prepare to be flamed…everyone keeps saying “Islam promotes peace” or paraphrasals of same.
Most Muslims promote peace, I’ll grant - but the Qur’-an, like other religious works I’m passingly familiar with, is full of contradiction and promotes both peace and warfare. Muhammed himself was a pretty warlike guy. More than once, are passages in the Qur’-an along the lines of “We killed 90% of the people in the town, and the other 10% spontaneously converted to Islam because God changed their hearts.”
Like Christianity, Islam has largely spread as Islamic military leaders have conquered land.
For slamming a religion, call me bigoted, a hater, whatever. In my view, God, whoever Ips may be, doesn’t seem too invested in anybody knowing what Ips is all about. Most religion seems pretty random to me.
Sorry, Manservant Hecubus, but you’re utterly wrong on this one. Saying “Islam promotes peace” in relation to the OP is about as topical as saying “frogs are pretty.” It just doesn’t fucking matter.
Ben Stein’s comment was inaccurate and poorly thought. “Atheistic” does not mean “immoral.” It means “lacking a belief in a god.” I’m not interested in artistic or literary interpretations of the word. Hell, I could as easily write a column that says “What do you do with such Christian evil?” and be precisely as accurate as Ben Stein. After all, Christians (or some of them) have a similar history of brutality.
As it stands, and particularly in today’s political climate, his use of the word “atheistic” is irresponsible and inflammatory. I don’t appreciate having my philosophical viewpoint equated with mass murderers.
Let’s suppose, just for the sake of argument, that you can successfully argue that Osama bin Laden is not a Muslim. (Although more on that below.) “Not a Muslim” does not equal “atheist”. Unless maybe you think Billy Graham and the Pope are atheists, too?
War is peace! Ignorance is strength! Freedom is slavery!
Some people define “Jew” to mean “the subhuman spawn of Satan”. I try to avoid using the definitions of bigoted self-righteously ignorant assholes. Here’s the definition of atheist from a pretty decent dictionary:
It’s not what I would call a perfect defintion, but it will do. Mr. bin Laden made a little speech tonight:
Atheist: one who disbelieves or denies the existence of God or gods.
Osama bin Laden: A man who fervently believes in God (maybe not the same God as Muslim Guy’s God, but some God, anyway), gives thanks to the aforesaid God, claims to be acting in aforesaid God’s name in everything he does, etc., etc., etc.
I’d say that pretty much lets Osama off the hook atheism-wise, and lets atheists off the hook Osama-wise. We ain’t talkin’ fucking Joseph Stalin here.
Oh, and what did Mr. bin Laden go on to say?
Well, surprise! Surprise! It looks like Osama bin Laden is a…SHOCK…Muslim!
Maybe he’s a bad Muslim. Maybe he’s whatever the fuck term Muslims would use for what Christians call a “heretic”–a sub-par, theologically and morally defective, not-getting-the-Word Muslim. But he’s sure as fuck not an Episcopalian.
You’ll “call me on it” if I point out the plain fucking truth? Well, Sparky, I’ve got a couple of thousand posts now. Even leaving out the quips in MPSIMS, you’ve got a lot of posting to do.
Osama bin Laden is a religious fanatic. He is not an atheist.
I read what you said. I think pretty fast, you know. What you said was stupid. Figuring that out does not require me to fast in the fucking desert for forty days and forty nights.
If pointing out the truth and castigating stupidity is going to “get you started”, then I hope you’ve got a fast Internet connection and a healthy ticker, 'cause you’re going to be “getting started” a hell of a lot.
This would be more impressive if you were actually making an argument that made any sense.
And I’ll think you’re a posturing self-important blowhard for…well, at least as long as this thread keeps going. After that, I imagine I’ll lose track of your existence.
Beloved, let us love one another. He who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
This is all I have learned in my life that is really worth knowing.
Well, atheistic or not, I just hope that the terrorists didn’t Jew the flight school instructors out of their money. It would be a real shame to find out your students were terrorists and not even get to make your house payments because they decided to be a bunch of Jews about it.
Given that secular humanism promotes peace, suppose some radical atheist terrorists were to blow up something. We would then face a dilemma. On the other hand, you maintain that “atheistic” means “immoral,” so technically we should describe such an act as “atheistic evil.” On the other hand, secular humanists are pro-peace atheists, and thus the terrorists are, in a tortuous sense, anti-atheist, making them theists.
[Robert De Niro as SATAN]
Theres enough religion in the world to make men hate each other, but not enough to make them love each other.
[/Robert De Niro as SATAN]
Actually, Ben Stein is pretty well known in conservative circles (outside of his TV gig). He writes a column for The American Spectator and often contributes to other conservative papers and magazines. Many in politics consider him first and foremost a conservative thinker and second a TV host (though the public rarely see him outside of TV - or “Bueller, Bueller”). He’s also bitterly clever. (If you dispute this, read more of his stuff.)
Oh, and I happen to think he’s nearly always wrong. But in this case, despite all the bickering, I think he merely meant “Godless” in place of “atheistic.” Thus, the sentence would read “What do you do against such Godless evil?” In other words, the evil is Godless or atheistic, not the men who performed it. “How could such evil (that is beyond God or without God) possibly exist and what do you do about it?”
Hey, maybe I’m stretching things. But Ben Stein is no idiot. (A prick, yes, often, but not stupid.)
Manservant Hecubus. You still think that in the year 2001, “atheist” and “immoral” mean the same thing? If Stein meant “immoral,” then he should have said “immoral.” An atheist is someone who does not believe in a god or gods. The etymology is quite simple, and no part of it in any way suggests that it can also be taken to mean “immoral.”
Granted, in another era entirely, anyone who claimed not to believe in God would have been thought by just about everyone to be immoral. I like to think (and dictionaries seem to agree with me on this one), that this is no longer the case.
There are many ways Stein could have made this statement:
“… acts that fly right in the face of all Islamic beliefs”
“… acts that defy morality, regardless of one’s religious faith”
or more simply:
“… immoral acts.”
I think that your little “it also means IMMORAL” remark sounded rather desperate. Almost like someone who needs some quick "facts"0 to save himself from drowning in the middle of a debate. Either that, or you really think that the terms are synonyms, in which case I will now begin to worry about you a whole lot.
Accusing MEBuckner of being ignorant, or a dumbass - immediately after making a more-than-a-little-ignorant observation like that one is going to force some dictionaries to revise their entries under the word “irony.”
Which is why I said I might see reason to give him benefit of the doubt and chalk it up to poor word choice. At the same time, if he floats in conservative circles, then perhaps he is one of the atheist=evil types (warning: over-generalization).
But mind you, when I called Ben Stein an idiot and theistic bigot, what I really meant (so long as we can define words as we like) was that he was “rather smart” and “rabidly tolerant of dissenting views.” Honestly, I wasn’t out to insult him - it was just poor word choice on my part.
