Why do atheists care about religion?

[alp227]

Run time: 05:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4fQA9mt-Mg   Posted on YouTube: August 18, 2006 By YouTube Member: imrational Views on YouTube: 637668   Posted on DU: November 21, 2010 By DU Member: alp227 Views on DU: 1493

 

[shoreline]

1. I care too...

...as an atheist who has never been shy about sharing that fact, I've heard every argument for theism - and not one of them makes a lick of sense. And while some religious people "accept" my atheism, they can't grasp its real nature; they desperately need to believe that I, even though I have made clear I do not believe in god, am willing to hierarchically rank other's beliefs - with Christianism always on top. I doesn't work that way - all religions are equally invalid. That is not to say that the adherents to various religions equally persecute their own versions of infidels - they don't - but the practices of religion really have nothing to do with the belief in god.

[gmoney]

2. Not bad, but really buries the strongest points

a lot of the stuff in the first 2 or 3 minutes is kind of small potatoes, like the Boy Scouts and buying housewares on Sunday more than 25 years ago... oh yeah, and by the way, religious zealots are going to kill us all at some point.

The cheeseball music and lack of conviction in the narration also undermines its effectiveness.

Re-prioritize the points, throw out some of the lame stuff, and be a little more polished in presentation. Also, trim it down...

As it stands, it's not going to provoke much thought in anyone but other atheists, which is like preaching to the choir, so to speak.

[Bucky]

3. Good question. And why do moms pushing strollers across the street worry about cars?

[gadjitfreek]

4. God is Santa Claus for grownups.

"OK, Billy, it's time I told you. Santa Claus is not real. What a silly idea...some invisible guy who watches you and decides if you're good or bad and rewards you if you're good and punishes you if you're bad. Now, let me tell you about this invisible guy who watches over you and decides if you're good or bad..."

Religion is a form of mass mind control. Always has been, always will be. I am watching the country I live in turn itself into a theocracy. A Christian version of Iran.

[herbm]

5. Not making a lick of sense to you is not the same not making a lick of sense.

[herbm]

6. And why can't atheists make there argument without insult?

[dmallind]

7. as opposed to the gentle kind compliment of thinking we'll burn forever for disagreeing with Xians?

[herbm]

8. Who said that?

[baldguy]

10. Um, every believer?

And if you don't think so, no one church that doesn't.

[herbm]

12. I'm a believer and I have no idea where you're "going", and if you are happy with where

ever it is you're going, that's fine with me. My concern is where I'm going. I'm pretty darn confident I'll get there.

[cpwm17]

16. I accept death after life as reallity

Your comment is vague so I’m not quite sure where you are coming from. Many so-called “believers” in the US believe they deserve to go to a heaven for their thoughts. They also believe that people who don’t think like them deserve an infinite punishment forever - that’s scary.

I’d rather die and not go to a heaven than for anyone to go to a hell. A hell would be so disgusting and would have no purpose.

We are all going back to the place where we came from – that’s reality. I wish we lived a lot longer. But life is short and when we die we become dead.

[herbm]

18. If it works for you, fine, but remain open to the possibilities there just might be something else.

[cpwm17]

27. You may not be 100% wrong

It's not a matter of what works for me or what I want. I just have to accept reality as it is.

The brain that I was born with tells me that all of these typical beliefs concerning the afterlife are not true. I can't believe any other way. I'm sure what my brain tells me about the afterlife is true, and I accept this as reality.

Though, I must add, there is a form of reincarnation that I can't completely discount. I don't believe in any gods or outside conscious powers. But, before I was born I (my consciousness) was nothing, and after I die I will become nothing again. What's to prevent my conscious self from reappearing in another conscious critter anywhere else in our or any other universe again? - nothing as far as I'm concerned.

Since your consciousness is entirely a brain process (there is no soul), all of your memories are destroyed after you die. But if the brain process that produced your consciousness is repeated in another critter, your consciousness could appear again. If you believe that this form of reincarnation is not possible, then you seem to believe that there is a soul that gets destroyed after you die. The dead soul prevents your consciousness from reappearing. That sounds like metaphysical nonsense to me.

Our Universe may be infinite. And there is a good possibility that there are an infinite or a huge number of universes outside our own. So there could be infinite number of planets outside our Earth with life. The possible, given an infinite number of opportunities, is guaranteed to happen an infinite number of times. By our very own existence, our conscious selves are proven to be possible. So it seems that there is a good possibility that we will be reincarnated an infinite number of times - everlasting life and no god.

[herbm]

28. In the general state of the planet, I'll take it.

[dmallind]

23. you made a general point. So did I.

All surveys show a majority of Christians believe in hell as a literal destination and that salvation depends on (at least) faith. Even those who believe works are a requisite also see faith the same way. I know DU believers tend to get a bit wussy on it when called, but you said atheists, so I am using Christians as a group

[herbm]

30. Name a survey. I wasn't that general. But I'll take this thread as a cross section.

Almost all of the atheist cant here took the form of atheist are right because christians are so wrong. My observation is and remains: atheism bases its legitimacy on bashing Christians.

Even if ALL Christains beleived that you are going to Hell express lane, how does that affect you personaly, you don't believe in Hell, right? A person is as likely to be assaulted over belief by a Christian as he is to be belittled by an atheist over belief. Two side of the same coin. The difference is that a lesser proportion of Christians will speculate on your going to Hell than the proportion of atheists insulting ALL Christians.

I don't know of anyone else's destination to either Heavan or Hell. It would not be right or healthy to spend my time working up the lists. It certainly is not my place. I only can speak about one group. Those who intentionaly turn their back on G*d knowingly. That is, they know G*d and they turn. Everybody else? Its none of my business because knowledge is free will. You don't know G*d and want to know Him, well I can help. You don't know him and don't want to, fine. As a christian, I am there. How either of these affect the destination, I do not know and I will not speculate. I am to treat you as if you are my brother in Christ in either case.

All I ask is a little civility in your effort to tear down what you don't feel.

[activa8tr]

9. What is THEIR argument that you find that they are making which is

insulting to you?

And as for the "Hell Fire and brimstone" religious fanatics. I find that kind of religion insulting to people's ability to think rationally and act morally, without the treat of "hell to pay for their sins" if they don't.

[herbm]

13. Take the next post for a conveniant example. What is it other than insult?

[activa8tr]

20. It is a fact that some Christian relious denominations threaten sinners with

"Hell fire and damnation". Not an insult, just a fact to be reckoned with when deciding if Christianity has personal appeal or fear and guilt to offer, and which denominations practice what beliefs.

I see nothing insulting about confronting facts.

[herbm]

22. Hillboro Baptist is not ALL Christians. All Moslems are not Taliban.

But it certainly seems like atheists can't disprove G*d and settle for slandering ALL christians. Like I said before.

[dmallind]

25. Did YOU specify a subset? NO! and far far far more than WBC believe in hell

for nonbelievers. Check out Pew belief surveys or Barna. it is a majority xian belief.

You said "why can't atheists.." without any qualifier and then have the chutzpah to whine that nobody pussy footed around parsing which kind of Christians do what in response! What typically arrogant special pleading! And you still don't see the equivalence do you?

[herbm]

26. And atheists believe Christianity is bunk, so tell me again about how reasonable atheists are.

I don't know who's going to Hell. The Bible is very clear: Judge not. I only know where my soul is going. Your defined subset was all Christians. And you are wrong. I don't know about all Christians, but I know about the ones I come in contact with and I know not even a small portion of them have any spoken thought on specificaly who's going to Hell and who's not. All I know is Christ said to treat everyone as if it were Him. And imperfectly I think most try. Don't give me bunk about wars, they're fought by atheists, too. And in a Nation where only around 30% claim to be Christian, why blame them?

[dmallind]

29. You STILL don't get it.

Is thinking Wicca is bunk reasonable to you? Sikhism? Atheists don't believe like you. That makes us unreasonable how exactly? YOUR "defined subset" was all atheists. What's the difference again?

BTW thinking you know where you are going is also judging.... It's God's call, right?

So have your buddies not mentioned how to be saved either? Saved from WHAT? Bet salvation is not achieved by atheism to your lot is it? Where do they think the unsaved go? Unless you are one of the very few denominations who either discard hell entirely or preach universal salvation there is no use you trying to weasel out of where atheists will go according to it. Be brave and actually stand up for your faith or will you deny it 3 times like Peter?

Where is this nation with 30% Christians? The US is fighting plenty with 83%.

[herbm]

32. Wicca doesn't hold anything for me. Who's slaming Wicca here? Its atheists (which Wiccans aren't)

that are slamming Christians. Again. Find one thread here by Christians built around atheism. There aren't any. Not one.

And no, its not G*ds call. He made it all mine. Next to Christ, the biggest blessing we are each given is free will. We not only get to make the decision we know our reward. G*d's choice was to allow me to make the choice. He did not want little god-robots, he wanted us to make choices. That is why I am againt Christian Sharia as well as Moslem sharia. I am against Christian Taliban. Or Atheist Taliban.

I don't know what the plan is for atheists. I don't know what the plan is for any other Christian, not even Hillboro Baptists. And believe it or not (except to some degree for Mormons, fundementalist Mormons and the Hillboro folks) christians don't spend anytime that I know of speculating and making lists.

Read that poll again. 30% claim a Christian religion, 83% claim to be Christian through some sort of spirituality. And when questioned can not cite any sort of core beliefs beyond a couple of "thou shalts". Like John Boehner and his Bill of Rights that he keeps in his pocket that when he recites it sounds like the preamble to Declaration of Independence. And he calls himself a Republican and I bet his grasp of GOP principles are even more sketchy. Most of that 83% is the same way. But don't ask me if they are going to Heaven, cuz I do not know and I do not waste my time speculating. But atheists will spend their time speculating on my sanity for being christian. And that is exactly my point.

[activa8tr]

35. You are still on your persecution campaign? Atheists whom you despise are

persecuting you and your fellow Christians?

That's a new one! Atheists simply don't care what the heck you want to believe, Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, Jesus, makes no difference to us, we don't believe any of them existed EVER. We just don't want you meddling in our government an forcing our government to give Christians special favors, like, for exanple, marriages only for one type of loving people, like, for example, only men loving women, but not the rest of the people living in the USA now.

If Christians want to believe something, fine, but don't put that down our throats through government laws and court decisions.

As happened HERE:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=385&topic_id=528538&mesg_id=528538

[dmallind]

37. You are fucking clueless.

Not Xians. YOU. You cannot tell the difference between an illustrative example and a question. You cannot either tell or admit when you are using a generic claim even though you criticize others for it. You cannot even understand simple sentences. You're lucky I DON'T, unlike you, extrapolate from one member to the group or my respect for believers would be far lower than your unreasoning scorn of atheists is.

[Name removed]

31. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[dmallind]

24. An exact analogof your post!!

You said "atheists can't" I maintained " christians think" AND with far more objective backup. I can point to surveys of Christian belief. What can you point to to show the aggregate arguing ability of atheists as a group?

[herbm]

19. Thank you for the gentle spelling smack. I don't spell very well and sometimes forget to spell check...

it. I get aggravated by those who drop the discussion and crow about spelling. Thank you for your civility.

[Name removed]

11. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[herbm]

14. Like I said.

[Cowpunk]

15. Forgot a big one, though they kind of hinted at it.

Religions train people from early childhood to accept obvious falsehoods as fact.

For example, I was taught as a Catholic that in the mass, bread and wine is literally converted into the body and blood of Jesus.

They train people to view critical thinking as a dangerous and subversive pursuit.

And we wonder why so many people can be convinced that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, or that tax cuts pay for themselves.

[herbm]

21. Christians and Saddam are not the same. Transubstantiation is more than turning bread to flesh. And

is not equivalent to lies about WMD. Again, why do most atheists have so much trouble stating their opinion without personalizing it so much? Could it be that as there is no scientific proof that G*d exists, there is no scientific proof that He doesn't? Proving negatives is a tough task that most atheists are underequiped to perform. How about we all lower the rancor a bit generally and specifically atheists quit striking out at believers on such a bitter personal level holding all believers responsible for the traumas suffered under a few or usualy one individual????????

[Cowpunk]

36. How about responding to what I actually wrote.

Are you trying to prove my point about critical thinking?

I never wrote that Christians and Saddam are the same.
I never wrote that telling children fairy tales is as bad as leading a nation to war on lies, just that there is a relationship.
I never wrote that I was an atheist.
What trauma?
What one individual?
What's this nonsense about proving God doesn't exist?
??????????

[activa8tr]

33. Great points! Yes, the tax cuts pay for themselves if you are a

god-fearing Republican! Heck, even some god-fearing independents believe that, too.

[MrModerate]

17. I don't think that religion is entirely deleterious . . .

In that it provides an organizing infrastructure for good works, can act as a social glue, and comforts those people who happen to be able to accept its tenets. (I speak very broadly, of course.) On the other hand, the negative factors cited in the video are undeniable.

Nevertheless, even as an unabashed atheist, I don't share the feeling of oppression the video conveys. I guess my take is that human beings believe so many fanciful and unprovable things -- only a subset of which can be classed as religious -- that I deliberately tread a path of tolerance and disinterest when those fancies intersect with my life. I've never been seriously burned in doing so.

At the same time, I counsel everyone to keep a sharp eye on creeping religionism and to resist efforts to tear down (or tunnel under, or slip around the side of) the barriers between religion and civil society. I think the US is definitely at risk in going too far down the god-botheration road.

I've been lucky to live in a lot of places where religion was present but not especially important -- and those places are much more tolerable and tolerant than the US. Be alert!

[activa8tr]

34. Defending Atheism & Update

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeSEDGioA90

[stlsaxman]

38. loved the premis, presentation and pictures...

hated the music.

kick, nonetheless... (too late to rec)