I’m beat down. Why are Mondays so long, even when you don’t accomplish half of what you wanted to do?
And I learned today that saying you have no use for religion whatsoever really upsets people. I’ll have to say it more often, then- I have no use for religion, I have no use for religion, I have no use for religion. I couldn’t care less what others believe in, and I’m never going to tell you what to believe in, but apparently that courtesy can not be returned by even our religious liberal friends. I’d also like to repost what Aimai said:
You know what would be really great? If all the fantastic (and they are fantastic) liberal/left Christians would spend five minutes a day writing angry letters to the Christian right wing about how unchristian they are instead of complaining to atheists about how much bad press you all are getting from the overt bad actions of your co-religionists.
As I noted, the reaction from some of you when I said I have no use for religion was so bizarre, you’d think I was raping kids, gay-bashing, trying to force all taxpayers to fund student groups that gay bash, trying to deny vaccines that prevent cancer to girls because they might have sex, helping the spread of AIDS with idiotic anti-condom crusades and failed abstinence only nonsense, denying people the possibility of medical cures because I have some fetish about a semi-meiotic glob of cells, dictating what women can do with their vagina, trying to make people stupid by denying basic science, and so on. All I did was say I want no part in religion. I’m not even putting up a fight over the overwhelming religious influence on my government, because I like the days off at Christmas and Easter and it is nice to see the majority of the country at least pretending to be happy. I even like Christmas carols and Gospel music! And I’m not throwing stuff in people’s faces like PZ Myers and the communion biscuit stuff- but you should really look at the amount of in your face stuff you religious folks push on other people.
I’m not your enemy, and I realize a lot of people find deep meaning and solace in God and your respective religious institutions. I’m just not one of them, and I just want to be left the hell alone. I don’t care what you believe in until you try to force it on me through the government. Then I’m gonna fight back. And what’s more American than that? It’s almost like the very first amendment in our Bill of Rights states just that!
Redshirt
I think we can all agree the FSM is wonderful.
Salt and freshly ground black people
Ooh you’re going straight to hell for that. I’ll be joining you there shortly after I pack my bags.
stuckinred
I’m with you 100% dawg! Fucking chaplains ran me off 43 years ago.
Adam Collyer
I respect that, Cole. And I think your words were taken out of context. You don’t have to have use for religion. Many of us do. To each his own.
Here’s what I object to – so-called liberals and progressives who preach tolerance, then insist on using language that consistently denigrates my beliefs. There’s nothing that bothers me more than hearing people say things like “the invisible sky man” in a condescending tone, as if it’s expected that everyone who has faith is a total lunatic who should be put in a mental institution. It especially bothers me when someone like Bill Maher does it, who then insists on having his own verifiably crazy beliefs about science and modern medicine.
If we’re going to preach tolerance and a big tent in this party and on this side of the spectrum, then let’s practice that. I do my thing, you do yours. Let’s let it be.
None of this implicates you, John. I very much understand your sentiments above. I just hope people will understand mine.
Martin
I have no use for the FSM whatsoever.
jeff
Myers is a douche and his hangers-on are an embarrassment. I like your commentary just fine. I don’t care how the observant feel so much as I am appalled at Myers’ behavior. In other words: fewer assholes, please!
mai naem
Well, I have a good friend who says man invented religion to keep a lot of us in line. I sometimes think he’s right.
beltane
I still don’t understand how stating that one has no use for religion is the same as an attack on religion. If I was a sincere believer, I would not care one bit if other people did or did not share my beliefs.
JWeidner
You’re in good company John. Here’s the text of a speech Adam Savage gave to the Harvard Humanist Society this month.
Martin
@Adam Collyer: Context matters. Typically, when I see the shots at religion from the left, it’s in the context of policy. If you want to ascribe to a certain belief system – that’s fine. If you want to use that belief system as a basis for policy that affects me, that’s not fine, and yeah, I’m going to climb up your ass about it.
The problem isn’t faith – it’s policy driven by faith.
Yutsano
@Martin: You don’t like pasta?
Ash Can
I think a lot of people around here are beat down on the subject. FWIW, I’m a fairly religious person and I don’t care if you don’t have any use for religion. Hell, there are times when I have no use for religion, either. As a matter of fact, according to the Gospels, Jesus himself had his moments with the religion of his day too. Same shit, different era.
Athenae
A lot of people think using the words “belief” and “faith” exempt them from argument. It’s bullshit, and the Jesuits who educated me and my husband would be horrified, like, God is not a free pass not to use your damn mind or defend your actions.
But it’s why people get so crazy when their “beliefs” are questioned, because they’ve come to think of “belief” as something they don’t have to think about at all, much less have to talk about coherently.
A.
different church-lady
You don’t know how their brains work, John: everyone has to believe in God or he/she/it doesn’t exist.
I know that’s not how the rhetoric works, but it is how the brain works.
mapaghimagsik
Atheist here. Guess I’m in the same boat. In a sense, I’m agnostic, that I’m not sure if there’s a FSM or whatever, but it wouldn’t change how I live my life if there is one.
In my more maudlin moments, I think Faith should have been the last evil to come out of Pandora’s box, instead of hope. However, in their own spaces, both are nasty little things.
Martin
@Yutsano: I like my pasta to stay on the plate, thank you very much. Though I wouldn’t turn down a beer volcano or a stripper factory.
Adam Collyer
@Martin:
That’s fine. I respect that. I still don’t see the vast majority of progressive Christians forcing their beliefs on others. That’s part of being a progressive. But what I’ve noticed is that whenever religion is brought up in ANY context, the knee jerk reaction from many on my own side of the spectrum is to act condescending and insulting. And it insults me.
xjmueller
Amen, brother.
beltane
@Yutsano: Maybe he’s allergic to gluten. Why are you so intolerant to those who suffer from food allergies? You are obviously an anti-glutenophobe.
different church-lady
@mai naem:
I think it was invented to give us moral guidance in a confusing and difficult world.
It was only later it got turned into an oppressive control device.
sukabi
You are not alone John… couldn’t have said it better.
El Cid
I have no use for religion.
This guy, however, found it useful to help keep up our Colombian allies’ predilection for running right wing paramilitary death squads to run drugs.
I have no use for religion whatsoever. None. Not the tiniest shred of a bit.
stuckinred
Two years ago a young woman from here was murdered in Chapel Hill. Today one of the killers plead guilty and avoided the death penalty. This caused an uproar on the local paper’s comments and ignited the religious morons to start their bullshit.
Yutsano
@different church-lady: Me personally, I don’t care if you believe or not. The Muse in Dogma said it best:
@beltane: I believe that gluten intolerance is an unnatural lifestyle and it should not be celebrated.
Oh and just in case any of you have celiac disease, my tongue is so far inside my cheek I’ll be tasting myself for a month.
Svensker
@Adam Collyer:
My BIL is a riot. He’s very liberal and will say, without any irony, “You know, I’m very tolerant of religion. People should believe whatever they want, I respect that. And if they’re assholes enough to believe in that stupid shit, that’s fine with me.”
But I’m tired and don’t feel very good. So phooey.
Signed,
Mrs. Crabbypants
smiley
@mai naem:
Your friend is a very original thinker.
Adam Collyer
Oh, and as a side note, I was actually at oral argument this morning for CLS v. Martinez, the Hastings case. I am a believing, if imperfect, Catholic. I think the position of CLS is complete nonsense. Some Christians can think for themselves.
scav
@Adam Collyer: Soon as I never hear “atheist” used as shorthand for lacking any and all morals and being incapable of knowing right from wrong, as well as being unquestionably unqualified for holding high elected office, I’ll consider removing objectionable language from my responses to religion being used as an aggressive tool.
mai naem
@Adam Collyer: I think it’s condescending to the right wing family values crowd – The people who say the gheys deserved AIDS, NOLA got Katrina because of the evil stuff in NOLA and Haiti got the earthquake because of voodoo.
Beej
@mai naem: “God created man and man, being a gentleman, returned the favor.”-Kurt Vonnegut in Cat’s Cradle
Linda Featheringill
Gee. Happy Monday night, everyone.
John, I am sorry you had a rough day. Maybe tomorrow will be better. And yes, you are protected by the First Amendment.
My sympathies to everyone who is trying to hold on to their faith in the face of some of the really stupid things so called “Christians” are doing these days. Might I suggest that you ignore the world for just a little bit and go back to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? They will last longer than the assholes in the news, anyway.
And remember that “Not everyone who calls me Lord . . . .. ”
Me? My religious stance changes from day to day. Who the hell knows? It is all much too mysterious.
Cat Lady
I ask people who ask me if I believe in God to define the term, and then I’ll answer them. I usually start with “do you mean the Old Testament God or the New Testament God?” Silence ensues, or maybe it’s the “go ahead, I dare you” look I give them. It’s all a pretext to let them know they’re going to get an argument, and they’re not going to win it, so don’t start, so they don’t.
I do always happily share that I believe in and practice the Golden Rule, which I also believe is the Alpha and Omega of the world’s religious traditions. So far so good.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
No sir, you are not. Nor am I yours. I am a John Cole fan and still are. The reason I said what I said could be found in Kid Blitzer’s comment, or that I had not heard you be that cynical on religious threads before, and I also see a change in your writings overall lately. I think it is the lack of critical thinking and attention to nuance that I have admired about your writings when I first came here.
I have no idea why, and I could well be wrong about this change, it would not be the first time. I know it is not easy being a former republican adapting to the ways of the left, as I’ve always been left and fumble around with it as well. Just know that whatever criticism I send your way, even if it’s packaged in my patented smart ass way, is meant as constructive.
gbear
@Adam Collyer:
I have no use for your comment.
El Cid
Any Supreme Being who’s worried about whether or not I “believe” in him / it is clearly not worth my attention.
HeartlandLiberal
I grew up in the South. In my teens, I realized the Baptist church I had been raised in was a den of hypocrisy and racism. “Red and Yellow, Black and White, They Are Precious in his Sight.” Yeah. Right.
Then I realized that the Christian religion I had been raised to think was truth was just another myth, and no different from all the other myths and religions currently and historically. And religion was in fact one of the greatest sources of violence and suffering inflicted by humans against others throughout history. I mean, take the Spanish Inquisition. Please!
I also quickly learned that these were thoughts I was to keep absolutely to myself if I wanted to survive and not be totally rejected and labeled a pariah by those around me.
To this day, I just basically avoid letting the fanatically religious know how I feel, mainly because they appear incapable of accepting my agnosticism (not atheism, that would be just as foolish), and there is little left to talk about if you can’t talk rationally and factually about religion. And usually they are not capable of this.
It is like trying to talk politics with someone who watches nothing but Faux Noise Nutwork, and proceeds to tell me they are very well informed about contemporary American politics, thank you very much.
Funny thing is, I probably read more about the history of religion, including Christianity, than a typical room full of holy rollers. E.g. this past year I have read three of Bart Ehrman’s books on the history of the Christian Bible, its sources, modifications, translation; and his historical dissection of the key themes in Christianity, and the incredible wealth of internal contradictions in the New Testament. Fascinating stuff. I cannot recommend his work highly enough. I plan to read one of his most recent, on the recently discovered Gospel of Judas, in the next few weeks as soon as I can get to it.
Pigs & Spiders
@xjmueller: I see what you did there.
BJ Platinum Member
Why should we have any more use for religion than we would have for any other sexually transmitted disease?
booner
John, for what it’s worth, I read the “offending” post earlier and was not insulted by it, even as a person of faith.
I say that as someone who has gotten offended in the past by blogosphere posts and comments that I felt were anti-religious, or anti-faith. You didn’t insult anyone’s beliefs (except maybe the right wingers’), you just said how you felt. That is how it should be.
Fact is, you are right. They are assholes and WATBs for trying to get special treatment. That is what is offensive, not your comment.
gbear
@Beej:
Beej. Are you originally from the Twin Cities? Are you that Beej? If so, cool.
Trainrunner
Adam:
Silly beliefs that fuck up our world should be denigrated.
If I believed that chartreuse hobbits told me to rape children, you’d think I was both criminal and crazy.
Yet you want “respect.”
Sorry.
Your beliefs deserve scorn and ridicule.
And, yes, you should be spending much more time grousing at your brothers and sisters on the right and moving THAT Christian Overton window and less clutching your pearls for insufficient “respect” from the left.
John Cole
@Adam Collyer: So why are you not blogging about that?
Adam Collyer
@gbear:
And I, yours.
Graeme
I’m right there with you, Cole. Repeat the message as often as you deem it necessary.
Randy P
@Cat Lady: My “religious” views are decidedly oddball and in the light of day probably closer to agnostic than religious. My view on most of the unanswerable questions is usually “don’t know, no way to find out, not important to know”. Nevertheless, I’m comfortable going to church, though I most closely identify as a Unitarian.
Anyway, along the lines of your post, sometimes I’ll make the statement that I believe that prayer works. But what I mean by “prayer” and what I mean by “works” may not be the same as what most people mean when they want to either defend or attack that statement.
I think I’ve had some odd experiences that are in line with what people call religious experiences. I accept that they are totally subjective and could have taken place entirely within my own mind. I also accept that if there was some external entity involved, it could just as easily have been the Flying Spaghetti Monster, aliens, angels, or any of a host of theories postulated for similar experiences in hundreds of New Agey books. And no particular reason to think there’s a connection with either the New Testament God or the Old Testament God.
jl
Well, Cole, this religious person does not care at all whatever you say.
I am a very religious person who believes in a religious reality. I read the Bible seriously, especially the Gospels, though I do not believe in the myths. I take Buddhism very seriously.
All the ‘flying spaghetti monster’ crowd can ridicule me. I do not care. Make fun of religious stuff, people, this or that God or god, or Son of God, blaspheme, call me stupid, whatever. People should spend their time doing as they please. I really do not care one bit.
I do not understand why there is so much fuss about it.
People who do try to force religious beliefs into public life, or government, that needs to be opposed, so I concentrate my responses to bizarre beliefs there.
It bothers me that a very debased, and I think heretical, sect of Christianity, the Xtianists, seem to be shaping a de facto established religion in the country.
Some one like Madison would have a difficult time getting elected in most parts of the country today. And if he were president today his public policies regarding religion and religious observances would create constant scandals among the wingnuts and Xtianists. He would be considered a militant atheist.
Same might go for Franklin, Jefferson and Adams, if their personal beliefs were known. None of them would qualify as fit Christians by today’s mass media and Xtianist standards.
Not sure how to change that, but I think that fact is more important than Holiday displays, or whether some militant atheist wants to make a spectacle of him or herself, or slogans on coins.
I think there is a de facto religious test for participation in national politics. Open atheists and agnostics need not apply, and as a religious person, I think that is dangerous.
Guster
@Cat Lady: Not believing in the existence of God is silly. It’s like not believing in Tuesday or elves. They’re right there in the dictionary. Clearly they exist.
That’s my problem with the definitional conversation. Pretty soon you’re going round and round like stoned sophomores.
Vince CA
Having never been raped by a Catholic priest, I can’t pretend to understand religious and sexual frustration–just the latter :-) The Catholics are sodomous jerks, the Protestants wouldn’t know a Christ if its head bashed their BMW, and the other religions out there tend to stay out of my way except when they’re blowing up my compatriots for raping their own spits of sand (and I have a lot of trouble faulting them for that).
God is a joke, and I’m not asking Hastings Law School (two of my best friends graduated there and neither could care two camels’ testicles for whatever the xtian groups thought about them) to endorse me. Fcuk religion, the pegasi they rode in on, and all that stupid carp that was supposed to make me feel bad about myself but just made me feel bad about myself to the point of rejecting Catholicism.
Go Bears. Also. Too.
PS I need a drink.
wonkie
What’s foolish about atheism?
I’m one. Always have been.
The world seems pretty mysterious and miraculous to me without believing in the supernatural.
Adam Collyer
@Trainrunner:
There’s plenty of good that comes from religion. Much of it was discussed in the previous thread. There’s plenty of terrible things that come with it too. You can choose to put more emphasis one way or the other as you wish.
But my Catholicism isn’t telling me to rape children. People have used their positions of power to do so. That isn’t my fault. And to be perfectly blunt, you have no idea what I say or don’t say to people who I feel have abused the good things that Christianity does, so you can feel free to judge me on your own preconceived bullshit if you wish.
And this is “pearl clutching?” I made a perfectly calm, rational post on comments on a blog. If it’s pearl clutching to say I’m insulted when people paint me with a stereotypical brush, then I suppose that’s what I’m doing. But that’s never been the definition that I’ve gone with.
GregB
It really does floor me that so many people in this country believe that society at large is discriminating against them due to their Christian belief.
Do you honestly believe that?
DougJ
@Adam Collyer:
I hear where you’re coming from. There are people of faith who have led far braver lives than I ever will and who did so in the service of ideals that I share and out of a faith that I don’t. Who am I (or anyone else) to question their beliefs?
At the same time, Christianity, as I understand it, does revolve around an invisible man in the sky. If people use their belief in that invisible man in the sky to do good things, then more power to them.
But I don’t see why I should have to pretend their belief system doesn’t involve an invisible man in the sky.
Adam Collyer
@John Cole:
At some point, I will. Just walked back in the door from a 5 hour Bolt Bus trip. Sitting in traffic from DC to NYC is exhausting.
Suffice to say though that for a law student, this was an unforgettable day. Saw oral argument on a pretty well publicized case, then spent part of the afternoon meeting in a very small group with Justice Breyer. He’s a remarkable legal theorist, and a true gentleman.
matoko_chan
An Open Letter to the Christians.
Dear Christians,
The reason people hate you and mock you is that your religion tells you to proselytize, whether you act on it or not.
The “Good” Word, lol.
The act of proselytizing is rude intellectual molestation.
Your religion is simply NOT better than everyone else’s religion or unreligion.
All religions evolved as fitness enhancers for homo sapiens sapiens, to spread genetic kinship benefits to a larger memetic tribe.
No religion is any “better” than any other.
Stop proselytizing and trying to push your religion on others and we will stop mocking you and hating on you, mmmmmmkay?
Chet
My sympathies as well, but might I suggest that you put down the book by ignorant swineherds and try atheism? Maybe the answer to your crisis of losing your faith is to just go ahead and lose it?
If you can figure out which moral manual to read, do you really need the manual in the first place?
jl
@HeartlandLiberal:
“Bart Ehrman’s books on the history of the Christian Bible, its sources, modifications, translation; and his historical dissection of the key themes in Christianity, and the incredible wealth of internal contradictions in the New Testament.”
Every Christian should read these books.
Randy P
@wonkie: I for one don’t think there’s anything foolish about atheism. I’m a great admirer of Penn Jillete’s well-known “This I Believe” essay.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5015557
I’m also a great fan of Jefferson in general, but especially in his attempt to de-mystify the Gospels and separate the teachings from the magical mythology. That’s probably the kind of thing that made him persona non grata with the Texas school board.
I’m appalled at the statistics in those “would you vote for an atheist” type survey, in a country which supposedly values religious freedom.
@matoko_chan: Your post is addressed to Christians who proselytize. Do you believe that is a majority of self-identified Christians?
arguingwithsignposts
Once again, a fascinating tale from This American Life’s “Enemy Camp 2010”:
Wall flipped and helped an attorney with a bunch of lawsuits against the Catholic Church.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
And from that thread I have been thinking about religion in this country, and like it or not, it permeates everything we do on this soil. I am not formally religious, and deeply resent self righteous right wing people, and any of the left also that dictate to me how to live and think. Always have and grew up ass deep in the Southern Babtist world and got dunked many times in the local rivers to prove it. I never bought any of that kind of spirituality, of guilt and damnation and life just being a waiting room for the afterlife, whichever direction that went.
I hated religion of all kinds, but have moderated in recent years after seeing many people find solace and serenity in it. You don’t hear about them like the wingnut ones who spend every waking moment it seems plotting yelling at the moon on how to make everyone believe and act like they do.
One note on the issue of religion causing wars and much evil I heard others say in the previous thread. I used to say much the same, but thinking about, humans did all and more evil things to one another before organized religion came about. It only gave them a chance to be sanctimonious about their murder and mayhem and to carry flags with white crosses and crescent moons on them.
And since it is impossible to prove a negative, who’s to say what murder and mayhem might have not occurred due to religious belief over the ages. It’s like blaming the republican party for it’s crazy members. Karl Marx called religion “the opiate of the masses” for a reason.
mikey
The religious have the “god problem”. That is, they tend to be educated people living in the 21st century and they can’t help but notice that their “faith” is in a set of supernatural beliefs created by peasants with no access to science almost two thousand years ago.
Which is to say, there is a part of them, inside, who knows there is no ‘god’, there are no ‘angels’ who know jesus was a pretty cool anti-occupation insurgent political activist in the mold of hezbollah, and all of that is frightening to them. Because as children they were taught about going to hell.
It’s funny, actually. Tell an American christian that had they been born in Tehran they’d be islamic and their head explodes. Ask them to explain why all the thousands of OTHER supernatural explanations, all the millions of other gods and godlets are WRONG and their selection is RIGHT and they can’t offer up a theory. When the explanation (childhood indoctrination) explains the child in Tehran as well as the child in Dallas.
We’re getting to a point where supernatural explanations for real world events are unacceptable, so they find themselves in retreat. And any student of history will tell you that the majority of wartime atrocities are committed by routed armies.
Bundle up, folks. Hands and feet inside the ride at all times. It’s gonna get bumpy…
mikey
mr. whipple
Down to 5:29 in a very close game between the Cavs and Bulls.
Any folks of faith that wanna pray for the Cavs, please do so now.
Alex
The act of proselytizing is rude intellectual molestation.
Your religion is simply NOT better than everyone else’s religion or unreligion.
My sympathies as well, but might I suggest that you put down the book by ignorant swineherds and try atheism? Maybe the answer to your crisis of losing your faith is to just go ahead and lose it?
Two different people, I know, but I just thought I’d point it out.
Ruckus
Mrs. Crabbypants
It’s OK, you said it just fine. If it’s supposed to be each in his/her own beliefs then the problem is that no one actually thinks about religion. They just accept it. And believe it.
In my case the more I thought about religion, the why, the how, and the more BS that tagged along in the wake of any of the religions that I studied, the more it became WTF.
So John, I agree with your rant 100%. I have even been trying to get some phrases out of my head and my speech, like goddamn, bless you, god speed and so on. On that note I saw a replacement for god speed once and now can’t find it. It was something like drive fast and don’t hit anything, but that doesn’t sound right.
Guster
@matoko_chan: I’m an atheist Jew who often condescends about Invisible Telephatic Entities, and I’m baffled by the notion that the act of proselytizing is ‘rude intellectual molestation.’ It’s just someone trying to convince me of something I find silly. Is it also intellectual molestation when someone tries to convince me that cilantro tastes gross?
In fact, objecting so strongly to proselytizing strikes me as a mirror image of objecting so strongly to ‘Invisible Sky Giant’ ridicule. If you’re secure in your beliefs, you don’t much mind either one. (As long as they don’t rise to the level of discrimination, of course.)
Cat Lady
@Randy P:
I think we all have moments where we’ve connected with something deep. Mine was one amazing day with LSD. I got so much out of it that I never needed to set foot in a church or listen to anyone else all these years later. Anyone who has to go to some building for an hour a week is missing the point, IMHO. Go inward, and you don’t need to go to a place or any middlemen to do it. It sounds trite, but yet true – we are all the Buddha.
mai naem
Part of the problem is religion vs. god. Religion is the one with the stupid crap about having women cover up head to toe and men wearing skull caps, having communion, not working on the day of the lord, not using a car on Saturday, fasting on day x – all that garbage. God is just god and can be whatever you choose go to be.
Nylund
I’m with John on this one. I really appreciate a lot of volunteer work many churches do, and have even thought of joining a congregation just for that reason, but I really can’t stomach the stuff about denying HPV vaccines or proper treatment to rape victims based on religious views. I know some churches are much more tolerant on such issues, but I’d feel like such a phony knowing that no matter what, I will simply never believe the resurrection, etc.
In fact, the whole idea of “choosing” a religion seems absurd to me. Something is either true or not true. I can’t simply “choose” what is the truth. The truth just is.
Of course, if the truth is unknowable, the closest we can get is to believe something is the truth. But, at this point, no one is going to be able to convince me that their doctrine is the “right” one. I’m never going to be convinced that out of the Catholics, Methodists, Jews, Muslims, Mormons, and Hindus I know, one group has it all right and the others don’t.
In fact, I was just in a conference with a very international attendance and I looked around knowing that such a multitude of faiths were present, and I imagined standing up and point to one and saying, “You are right about life, death, God, and everything. The rest of you vary from being somewhat incorrect to entirely wrong.” That would be horribly rude of me, but honestly, if I “chose” a religion, isn’t that what I’m implicitly saying?
But if it makes you happy, and you don’t do harm then any people, then I’m happy to sit back, look at all those people and think, “you may be right, you may be wrong. I don’t know, and I won’t pretend to.”
cdmarine
I’m so with you on this. No use for it, and I resent the constant social pressure I get because of it. I don’t understand why people can’t just let each other be!
Alice Blue
No offense taken, John. I go to church once a year, when I visit my mom on Easter Sunday. I guess I have more of a problem with organized religion, rather than Christianity itself.
This passage from Truman Capote’s “A Christmas Memory” has comforted me more than anything I’ve ever read in the Bible:
Josh
I learn as much as I can from people of different religions without letting their religious organization taint what I can learn from them.
I dated a Muslim girl and I learned a lot about Islam from her that you won’t learn just by observing.
I have nothing against religious people. I’m spiritual, not religious, but I like to talk to people who engage actively in a religion about why they do it and what they believe.
I don’t have a problem with religious people. I have a problem with religious organization.
jl
Jefferson advised some one in a letter that religious study should begin by questioning everything about it, including the existence of God, or god, or gods.
If that were leaked it would make a cool ad war in a modern election campaign.
Edit: “drive fast and don’t hit anything” ? Promising replacement. Needs some work on the public safety angle is all.
mclaren
@John Cole:
Unfortunately the commenters on Balloon Juice tend to become unhinged at the slightest provocation. There’s a surface appearance of superficial sanity, but underneath, the people on this forum are pure tea party material.
Suggest raising tax rates on the rich to what they were during the Eisenhower administration, and they call you a “Marxist.”
Propose paying firefighters or cops less than university professors, and they compare you with the Unabomber.
And this is liberals we’re talking about.
No wonder this country is in trouble.
Linda Featheringill
@Randy P: Christians who proselytize.
I never thought about it. Do you think that a majority of Christians don’t try to change my beliefs, don’t try to dominate me, and don’t stand up in public and say “What a good boy am I”?
Adam Collyer
@DougJ:
It’s less about the concept than about the tone, I confess. Also, the invisible man in the sky is a pretty base concept. According to many denominations, God exists in all things and all people in various forms. When people use the phrase, it belies their condescension.
Also, we spent last week in an Anne Laurie authored thread eulogizing a wonderful woman who was a Native American. Often times, Native Americans have very strong spiritual beliefs that are no crazier than your routine Christian views. I respect those beliefs, I respect Johns. I would think that most progressives, being open minded, would respect my own so long as I’m not forcing them on anyone.
Keep in mind that I’m not preaching here, nor am I suggesting that my religious views be imposed on the government that I support. I do think it’s fair to be granted some basic respect.
Josh
@jl:
Jefferson’s “Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth” is often called “The Diest Bible.”
I firmly believe that he was a Diest, which is what I consider myself to be, though I think I’m more like an aggregate of many different spiritual ideas rolled into one without the mysticism or dogma.
BR
(From the Adam Savage speech linked above.)
I find that this approach works well for me. In fact, it’s for this purpose that entheogenic plants come in handy; to step back and see the big picture. (Specifically cannabis sativa – not indica – and salvia divinorum.)
MikeJ
@matoko_chan:
lolwut? You’re the one who was telling us how Avatar was not just a great movie but was going to usher in a new age of harmony and love and sweep away all things evil. Which was fine. You saw something you liked. You told other people, “hey, you might like this too.” If the god botherers want to do the same, they’re free to, and it’s moronic to call it rude intellectual molestation. I’ll simply pay as much attention to them as I did to your movie reviews.
Litlebritdifrnt
Having studied religion (including two years under a very devout christian who was utterly brilliant and had the most open mind that I have ever known of a christian), I have to say meh. I believe in mother nature, because she is consistent, and, to be honest, she is a vengeful bitch. Other than that every religious belief there is is based upon the same sort of story. I mean you read the story of Jesus and you get the basic facts of Horus in the Egyptian faith, and many others. There are stories of a great flood a la Noah in all other faiths, they just steal each other’s stories is all. The majority of the Christian calendar was stolen from the pagans. I do not have a problem with a christian being a christian, I have a problem with christians imposing their religion on me through legislation. That is what I have a problem with. Keep your damn religion out of my politics and I am fine, try to impose your religion on me via legislation and I am gonna fight you tooth and nail.
Mike Kay
I believe in going to church every sunday! — unless there’s a ball game, on.
AhabTRuler
I think we should make it a drinking game!
Every time anyone thinks about talking to someone about their spiritual beliefs unbidden, drink!
I figure 95% of the world’s population would be paralytic inside of an hour.
Randy P
@Linda Featheringill: Yes. I believe that.
Episcopals, at least. Even when egged on by the pastor to invite a friend to church, one friend, once per year, the response rate I’ve seen tends to be somewhere below 1%.
I’ve known a lot of self-professed Christians (not the evangelical sort), and never known anyone who fit your description. None. Except the evangelicals, a distinct minority, though a noisy one. I think I’ve seen numbers in the neighborhood of 35-40%.
The problem, I guess, is you only know about the ones who buttonholed you and tried to convert you. You have no idea about the people who kept their beliefs to themselves, so you don’t think they exist.
jl
mclaren’s comment made me laugh.
This blog attracts the most interesting and unique trolls.
DougJ
@Adam Collyer:
I think religious beliefs deserve respect when they are clearly and reasonably articulated, the same as anything else.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Adam Collyer:
I respect your views, and I also respect your view not to impose them on me. Now could you please go and convince the rest of your bretheren?
frosty
@wonkie:
Exactly.
So I’m explaining to a colleague that the Susquehanna is the oldest river it the world. It cuts straight through mountain ridges, which means it was flowing when those ridges began to rise. Well, they began to rise when Africa hit North America to form the Appalachians. Africa is currently moving away from North America, to give you some idea of the timeline.
The Susky is at least 2 billion years old.
So he says to me that’s all well and good but earth is only 10,000 years old.
So I have to wonder what’s the fascination with the supernatural? Why invent some unprovable invisible explanation for the mysterious and miraculous stuff we see every day right in front of our eyes when the scientific truth is so much more miraculous?
Comrade Kevin
@mclaren: I see what you did there.
Keith G
@Adam Collyer:
There is your problem right there. Maher is a jester.
Here’s a hint: Don Rickles, Carrot Top, Moms Mabley et al, do not take them seriously. Their personality is their act and their act is their personality.
low-tech cyclist
You know what would be really great? If all the fantastic (and they are fantastic) liberal/left Christians would spend five minutes a day writing angry letters to the Christian right wing about how unchristian they are instead of complaining to atheists about how much bad press you all are getting from the overt bad actions of your co-religionists.
Been there, done that, even taught at an evangelical college for five years. There comes a time to stop banging one’s head against the brick wall, and move on.
I don’t think the evangelical right can be changed to any great extent. I’d be satisfied with changing the respect the media gives these clowns, which should in theory be a much more achievable goal, but doesn’t seem to be either.
Josh
@AhabTRuler:
You should sit around and watch one of the so-called “campus preachers” practice their craft. You’re head would spin. Once, at the U of Michigan Diag, this one pastor was extolling the evils of homosexuality, and he had an extension cord as a prop. He used the “male” and “female” ends to demonstrate how sex should work–
—and a student yelled, “It’s porn for your toaster!”
That’s downright funny. Once, a pastor pointed me out and told me I was going to hell. I looked at him, because I was just walking to my class, and said “I know. It’s a Stats class.”
Lyrebird
I think that which nerves are sorest in people re: religion is gonna vary a LOT depending on where they live.
In the southeastern states, kids can and do get beaten up in the playground for professing atheism… this would’ve been an “oh, okay, whatever” item at my school (Boston area).
At my college (which Nixon put on a watch list for pinko influences back in the day :-), admitting to any sort of spiritual curiosity was likely to get scorn & derision (though certainly not blows) in response.
Makes a difference.
I think that faith is highly personal, and me no care if you say i’m into the sky-fairy schtick… When we have safe schools and safe streets for everyone, maybe we’ll have time to debate personal beliefs, and until then, let’s keep working on policy.
Which needs humor! (thank you John Cole!)
ksmiami
Hmm – As a former Catholic now atheist, I see that people find answers and solace in faith, but to me I derive no comfort from religion and feel that it offers little to nothing in terms of understanding our modern world. I just live my life trying to do good, enjoying sunsets and this moment of existence and it is enough… See I am tolerant up to the point when religious nuts start telling me that their god is better than someone else’s or god hates abortion or this nation was founded under god or atheists should not hold political office. Then I just tell them that they are full of crap and have no proof of anything and certainly limited reasoning powers. George Carlin is my hero… As he said, “God created the earth and heavens in 7 days, but he always needs money!”
jl
@Josh: Hey! Watch it there buddy! You can poop on religion all you want, but hands off stats. I mean it.
Alex
Ah, the campus preacher…that lowest of life forms. Mizzou has its very own Brother Jed, who falls under the descriptor of “Decent entertainment on a weekday afternoon” more than anything religious.
Comrade Kevin
Since this is an open thread…
Where did the sudden recent wingnut obsession with Saul Alinsky come from?
mr. whipple
@Mike Kay:
I go to St. Mattress of the Springs.
Adam Collyer
@Litlebritdifrnt:
Working on it. Many of us are. We don’t seem to get a lot of press, though.
@Keith G:
You’re right, Maher is a jester. That being said, I was surrounded by people last year when “Religulous” came out who thought he was a complete genius. I tuned him out long ago, but it was the convenient and universal example to use, rather than some random GOS commenter.
SIA
@Martin:
This.
And
@Yutsano: Fucking hilarious!
I’m religion-neutral. (well, I was, but since the batshit crazy right hijacked it, now I pretty much hate religion). I happen to think there’s some kind of higher power or spirit, because my life pretty much depends on that.
kay
@Martin:
I’m not at all religious, but I always think about Jimmy Carter when this subject comes up. I think to ask Jimmy Carter to not acknowledge the central organizing principle of his life in his work is to silence him. I don’t know that he can do that. I think (suspect) it informs everything he does. He inevitably goes there. Of course he does. It’s what he is.
So that’s why I struggle a little with keeping religion out of policy. I think Jimmy Carter, or other liberal religious, would tell you that’s where he gets the principles that inform the policy.
It’s a tougher call than it appears. Liberal religious are better at threading that church-state needle, IMO, so I was more comfortable when religious like Carter were in charge. I was confident he wouldn’t cross the line.
frosty
@Cat Lady:
I tend to think it’s all brain chemistry. Asceticism, fasting, meditation, it’s all changing the chemical pathways. I had the same experience and find it really amusing that acid did the same thing instantaneously without all the work.
Josh
@jl:
HA HA!
I would have said the same thing if it had been my “eXtreme weather” class.
BTW, global warming does exist. My professor told me so. I’m inclined to believe him because his side-job is tornado chasing.
robert green
i find it highly amusing that my left wing friends seem to be oh so sure that jesus was a magical fairy pony alinsky-ite with some eugene debs thrown in, while my right wing friends are just as sure that jesus was the second lead in Red Dawn. you know what? they are equally wrong, equally as full of shit.
there was no jesus like you think. there is a vast preponderance of evidence to support that assertion. vast. archaelogical, historical evidence. there is almost no evidence to support ANY of the assertions made about this character (and don’t get me started on Horus, because then the whole JEsus story REALLY falls apart).
so, my leftie friends, keep pushing this nonsense, keep feeling special about it because by some CRAZY coincidence your belief system and your religion just happen to be congruent! whodathunkit?
me, i’m totally prepared for god to be whatever god is or isn’t based on when it does or doesn’t show up in a place and way that we can understand. give me a call when that happens. otherwise, piss off from the public square.
Randy P
@Josh:
But… but… isn’t that how gay male sex DOES work?
MikeJ
@kay: Carter didn’t try to tell people that if they disagreed with his policy ideas they were going to hell. Carter religion always seems to tell him to help people, where the religion of wingnuts seem to exist to attack people.
Trainrunner
I nominate Mikey @60 for best comment ever.
Billy K
You go on with your bad self, John Cole. The commenters on this blog are weird now. I’m not sure where they all came from, but I know I lost interest in a lot of them long ago.
sherifffruitfly
I’m with you John.
http://img124.imageshack.us/img124/533/motivator6518287lj1.jpg
Josh
@Randy P:
What was funnier is that this extension cord had a three-pronged female side, so he was inadvertently supporting polygamy.
Billy K
@mikey:
For the umpteenth time… Dallas is not rural Texas. You’d be shocked to find how secular it is.
(And in fact, almost no one has a drawl here, and I haven’t seen a cowboy hat here in months, if not years. Believe it.)
LD50
@mclaren:
Wow. Liberals have almost no political power in this country, and yet your fantasy vision of what ‘liberals’ think explains all the trouble this country is in.
Deficits. Violence. War. Poverty. Health care crisis. Environmental degradation. Just to start. All liberals’ fault, apparently.
Gee, thanks for clearing that the fuck up.
cleek
fuck yeah, JC!
Cat Lady
@frosty:
Yes, this. Catapulted, I think of it. Buddhist meditation practice trains you to access that state methodically and with pure intention, but I’ve been there, it’s still right there, and I remember because it’s my own mind. Everyone’s able to access it too, if they stopped thinking of an external source called “God”.
toujoursdan
I am a practising Episcopalian who serves on our parish vestry, but I don’t push my religion on anyone. Like most here I am embarrassed by how the religious right and Catholic bishops do evil in its name.
But also like others here, I am also frustrated by other liberal/progressive types who preach tolerance, respect and inclusivity for everyone except religious people. And I am tired of the stereotypes, the superficiality and strawman arguments that drive most online religious debates. They generate more heat than light and only serve to drive wedges between us.
I am willing to have a conversation on what religion really is, which as far as I am concerned isn’t about believing x, y or z about things but more about exploring life’s meaning using myth-story to communicate truths about ourselves and our world. And I am more than willing to discuss why I choose this path, but that’s different than pushing faith on anyone.
My God has room for everyone and if there is an afterlife I expect it will be every bit as diverse as this world.
If you have no use for religion, that’s fine with me because in my belief system that doesn’t mean that God has no use for you.
Violet
Thank you for this post, John. Like you, I wish people would just let others believe what they believe without getting their knickers in a twist if someone disagrees with them. Live and let live and all.
I hadn’t looked at the comments in that other post. Sheesh. People really do get bent out of shape about it.
themann1086
See, this bothers me. A lot. No belief is above ridicule or insult or insolence. It bothers you when people denigrate your beliefs… but then you go right ahead and call Maher’s beliefs “verifiably crazy”. This happens to be true, of course, but it’s hypocritical on your part.
You later go on to say you want respect. I respect you. I respect your right to your beliefs. I have no respect for your beliefs. Frankly, that’s how it should be. Beliefs never deserve respect; people and their rights always do.
Adam Collyer
@kay:
But there is a fundamental difference. President Carter’s views and policies may be informed by his own faith, but those policies can also be ascribed to a set of universal values of peace and social justice. That’s very different than having the state ban abortion because it doesn’t fit your moral compass. I don’t think being personally opposed to abortion but realizing that the state has an interest in protecting women’s rights is necessarily incongruent; some religious people, particularly on the right side of the spectrum, don’t see it that way.
matoko_chan
Guster, Randy, you mistake me.
The common denominator of christianity, as I understand it, is that christians believe they own the truth and need to spread the Good Word…..to “save” souls for Jesus.
I was raised catholic and attended parochial school, so I do understand this.
Missionaries and evangelists have caused most of the worlds ills.
Big White Christian Bwana…whether he was a catholic spaniard conquistadore, a catholic french haitian planter, or evangelical american Bush in Iraq…… imperialism, the crusades, pogroms, colonialism, genocides, missionariism, Operation Ajax, the British Raj, even Vietnam and Haiti bear the bitter scarred fruit of christian evangelism……
The Tea Party movement is at least 83% christian while America is only 70% christian.
I actually suspect nearly all the Tea Party attendees would self-identify as “christians”.
They genuinely believe that they have the right….erm….religious duty to impose their mores and doctrines on the rest of us.
Just listen.
Now I guess the tea partiers represent what Aimai would call rightwing or conservative christians as opposed to liberal christians.
Liberal christians need to take back their religion like Aimai says.
Bitchin’ about Cole or PZ hurrtin’ your fee fees is not productive.
Left/liberal christians need to take back christianity before the word christian becomes indelibly convolved with the Tea Party.
The Tea Party is simply a grievance movement of conservative christians.
They will blacken the name of Christ forever if you let them.
Left/liberal christians need to go to war, or risk the eternal defamation of christianity in the name of teabaggery.
BettyPageisaBlonde
I think of myself as an ecumenical atheist these days. That is, I’m fine with whatever you believe and I see no point in denigrating those beliefs. As long as that’s a two-way street, it’s all good.
MikeJ
@Josh: Two in the pink, one in the stink.
kay
@MikeJ:
Right. Honestly, I don’t even want religious telling me I’m going to heaven, so it isn’t the fire and brimstone I object to, it’s the “telling”, probably.
BUT, at the same time, people can thread the needle, and he did, and does, so it’s possible. Which is good, because many, many people are religious, to one extent or another.
I think what I would ask is a recognition from religious that we’re going to have to come to some kind of accomodation, and I’m willing to respect that, if it’s reciprocal.
There’s a reason it goes to the Supreme Court nearly every session, in one or another iteration. It’s difficult to figure out.
None of this addresses John’s topic, because I have forgotten what that was :)
Jeffro
I remember asking my very religious mom, way back when (i.e., at the age of 9 or 10, after reading an elementary school book on mythology), if those Greeks were wrong about Zeus and what not…
…I’m still waiting to hear a good answer.
(Also surprised she didn’t pull me out of public school at that point, btw)
burnspbesq
JC:
Well, no. It’s not almost like that; it’s exactly like that.
The Exercise Clause guarantees freedom OF religion.
The Establishment Clause guarantees freedom FROM religion.
And I’m perfectly willing to grab a two-by-four and go upside the head of any of my co-religionists who don’t get that.
slag
Not only do I have no use for religion, I have no use for professional sports. Anything that gives people a false feeling of accomplishment is not something I want to be apart of. Whether it be sitting in a pew or in a stadium, it doesn’t matter. It’s still just sitting. So, both preachers and Red Sox fans are just going to have to live without my high five. I’m sure you’ll all manage well enough.
Bordo
Since man is blessed (or cursed) with self-awareness, we are intrinsically sensitive to the idea that all of our actions on this earth mean something. We want to find some larger meaning as we scuttle through our lives, something to justify the bone-grinding work, the ongoing frustrations, the physical, mental and emotional pain we endure from birth to grave. Religion offers this balm to many.
I truly appreciate the sentiments of Mr. Collyer. My parents found great strength and solace in their faith. I do respect those for whom faith is real. But, like John Cole, it no longer works for me. I believe this life is the only one we get and we’d damn well better make the most of it.
Perhaps we can all agree to live by the Golden Rule. I will not sneer or condescend to those who find real strength and faith in their religion. I would appreciate it if those who are religious would grant me the same consideration. I do not want to be saved nor do I want to be lectured by those who see my very existence as a sin because I reject organized religion and those who run it.
kay
@Adam Collyer:
I buy that answer. That’s maybe why I don’t find him off-putting or threatening. I would say, if pressed, that he generally shares my values (ya know, my aspirational values) so that makes sense.
Anyway, he made me sympathetic to the idea that there has to be some way he (or people like him) can express what he is in his public work, or he won’t do the public work, and that would be a shame and a loss.
LosGatosCA
John, I have to differ with you. If you aren’t man enough to understand that religion protects little boys from being molested, gays from being discriminated against, people from being stuck in bad marriages, and women from being under the thumb from sexst pigs who would make them have babies no matter what . . . .
then you really don’t understand religion.
If it weren’t for religion,
I’d have no luck at all.
Alex
Slag, I don’t know many sports fans who see going to the game as an exercise in vicarious self-fulfillment. For most, it’s just entertainment. Your argument could be used on…well, any consumption of media, I guess.
burnspbesq
@stuckinred:
Bout time that bastard gets what’s coming to him. I don’t believe in capital punishment, but some days that’s a hard belief to maintain.
SIA
@Comrade Kevin: When they realized the Dems could ORGANIZE.
burnspbesq
@slag:
When you get to Heaven, Steve Gilliard is going to kick your ass.
r€nato
@beltane:
I’ve often encountered STRONG hostility from people who take their religion seriously, when they find out I’m agnostic. It used to puzzle me too; you’d think that their vitriol would be saved up for the people who are ‘on the other side’.
After thinking about it some, my take eventually became, “they’re pissed off because if everyone got the idea that not only do you not have to choose sides, you don’t even have to play the game, the jig would be up.”
@slag:
Are you a musician? If not, would you therefore not go to a concert?
arguingwithsignposts
@matoko_chan:
That’s a mighty big brush you’re painting with, matoko_chan. I’d argue that kings and queens and landed gentry have caused their fair share of those ills.
handy
American Fundamentalist Christians are the most persecuted group in the history of like the whole world…EVER!
r€nato
@Martin:
ah… but faith without action to follow them up, what’s that, then?
There’s a logical weakness to the argument that one should have beliefs but refrain from concrete actions based upon those beliefs.
(I’m playing devil’s advocate here, in case you can’t tell)
matoko_chan
No, sowwy, Adam Collyer.
Tea Party Jesus is going to be the official, standardized version unless you left/liberal/progressive christians get off your collective butts and do something about it.
themann1086
@arguingwithsignposts: Very true. Whether or not religious institutions have done more harm than good (and I do lean towards the harm side), it has nothing to do with why I’m not religious. I find the evidence unconvincing. That’s all.
That said, the recent dam-burst of revelations about just how deep the Church pedophile coverup rabbit hole goes has brought to mind the old saying: “Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.” Very unfair, some priests are nice people, but…
Kevin
I’m not quite sure why I have to *respect* someone else’s beliefs. I’ll respect your right to believe them, I won’t go out of my way to antagonize you about them (I’m an atheist, all my family and friends are Catholic, we seem to get along fine, and they know about my beliefs).
But what I can’t do is pretend to find your beliefs (be they Christian, Muslim, Native American, Hindu, etc) sane, or logical, or serious. So, it probably will come off condescending. But that’s life. Really, I don’t think anyone would have a problem laughing at the ridiculous Scientology beliefs about Xenu the intergalactic space pirate, or the story of Joseph Smith and Mormonism’s founding (along with the retarded beliefs about Natives being Jews and the racist ideology flowing from that). It seems that once a religion reaches a certain age, we are supposed to ignore the inherent silliness of it and pretend its a serious, thoughtful belief system. Well, I can’t do that. But I won’t point it out unless poked about it.
jl
No Bible verses yet? What kind of open religious thread is this?
It has become very clear to me that no one on this blog goes to their stats classes every week, and you are all going to burn burn burn in Hell for that.
Therefore I will inflict a Bible verse on the B-J sinners, for your sins. But the lesson first.
The atheists and nonreligious here should recognize that there is a gulf between different types of religious people that I think is as wide as between the religious and non-religious.
One camp believes that religion is about stuff you believe happened or will happen in the external world. The other camp believes that relgion is about how you think about things and what you do, or try to do with your life. These two camps do not understand each other.
So when atheists suggest some of us religious people try influencing our misguided bretheren, well, we do not live in the same spritual realms, even if the external names may be the same.
To illustrate, the two camps reach diametrically opposed lessons from Matthew 21:28 to 31:
But what think ye? A certain man had two sons; and he came to the first, and said, Son, go work to day in my vineyard.
He answered and said, I will not: but afterward he repented, and went.
And he came to the second, and said likewise. And he answered and said, I go, sir: and went not.
Whether of them twain did the will of his father? They say unto him, The first. Jesus saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.
Adam Collyer
@Bordo:
This is basically what I’ve been trying to say through my continued posts in this thread. Thank you for being more articulate than I am.
Martin
@frosty:
A lot of people have a really hard time grasping that we’re about as important to the universe as an individual bacteria is to any of us.
Remember, it wasn’t until 1917 that someone put forward evidence that we weren’t the center of the galaxy, and therefore universe. That’s not so long ago. Many, many people are rooted in the idea that their existence has some absolute meaning – that they aren’t just some accident of genetics and a wicked good set of starting conditions.
matoko_chan
All right Arguing…..I will rephrase that.
bettah?
thejoz
For me personally the only thing I think one could take from it is that your post seems to implicate any and all followers of any religion to be batshit insane.
If you have no use for faith or religion than do whatever the hell you want. That’s your right. But it’d be nice to not be lumped in with the right wing fundies that guys like you and us make fun of.
LD50
Another thing not often pointed out: the number of Christians in the US is declining. It’s been declining about 1% a year for a couple decades now, and despite the Christianists’ shrieking, this trend is not abating.
The people leaving are the moderates. The fundies are a bigger and bigger chunk of the people left. This is why the religious discourse in this country has gotten so poisonous.
Ruckus
@matoko_chan:
Left/liberal christians need to go to war, or risk the eternal defamation of christianity in the name of teabaggery.
Don’t know if you are saying this tongue in cheek or not but this is part of my problem with religion. This has been a religious staple for a long time. If your belief is not accepted by others then by all means it must be alright to go to war. It’s OK to fight and kill for your beliefs. What a colossal waste of human life and energy. We could all stand a lot less of believe what I believe or I’ll kill you. Or shun you. Or stone you. Or whatever. It’s BS at it’s highest level.
dcdl
@scav: I hear you on that one.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
I have no use for religion. I’m a former RC and I haven’t looked back since leaving. It’s a waste of my time. My wife and kids aren’t baptized and have no plans to do so. Life is busy enough without religion mucking it all up.
I’ve got better things to do.
matoko_chan
Well the big problem for me, Adam cher, is that your christian beliefs are convolved with the teatards christian beliefs…..as we say in mathematics, non-separable.
So as long as Tea Party Jesus is the official version you are going to get a tonne of mockery.
Clean your own House first.
Then we can talk about mutual respect.
:)
Those teabaggers are defining christianity.
And you are twiddling your thumbs and whining about politesse and the golden rule.
r€nato
I, personally, think that belief in a higher power is kinda like believing in Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.
But, I tend to keep that notion to myself (this comment being the exception to the rule).
However, atheists and agnostics – particularly those of a left-wing bent – ought to keep in mind that the civil rights movement was VERY religion/church-based.
So, if MLK’s generation had paid heed to the idea that they shouldn’t foist their religious beliefs on everyone else, we probably wouldn’t have had a civil rights movement at all.
burnspbesq
@robert green:
No. I won’t try to ram my beliefs down your throat, but when I enter the public square I am NOT required to leave them behind. Your views are profoundly un-American.
jake the snake
@Beej:
Vonnegut stole that line from Mark Twain.
Don’t forget Arthur C. Clarke’s famous quote.
And as I sometimes say about it, “It is all human morality, but the unpopular stuff gets blamed on a deity.”
matoko_chan
Ruckus, it is comedie noir.
Adam…..
the problem is the teatard christians are definitely prancing and braying in the public square, and your beliefs are getting zero airtime.
They are far more loud and flamboyant.
They define you, Christian.
matoko_chan
renato, MLK’s generation was forcing their CITIZEN rights on everyone, not their religion.
Svensker
@matoko_chan:
Don’t think the Chinese would agree with you.
Ruckus
@r€nato:
Yes a lot of the people in the movement were religious persons by any definition. But my recollection is that they were talking about civil rights not as religious rights but as human rights. Maybe I’m remembering wrong and I’m sure that some discussed this in a religious setting but that didn’t seem to be the main reasoning.
r€nato
@mikey:
You know, I think this thought occurred to me when I was about 11 or 12. All on my own. It was one of my first clues that just maybe, religion was a concoction of men designed to serve the desires of men, not a god.
I mean, what loving god would condemn 99% of Chinese to everlasting torment just because of western Christianity’s undeniable ethnocentrism?
Ruckus
@matoko_chan:
Ahhhh!
williamc
@Cat Lady:
Right on Cat Lady!
Late to the party again, but its been a crap busy day, but whenever I hear of someone who came to “the end of that god-business” through an awesome trip, I know a kindred spirit is near. I had an LSD trip in my undergraduate days where I totally lost the path of sanity and eventually found my way back to it, though sometimes having to argue about verifiable history with a young gay wingnut at a bar in Atlanta makes me feel like I never really came back to sanity (Reagan did too raise taxes and increased the deficit!). I was so in my own mind during this trip that all of the questions that I had ever had about what life was about answered themselves and when I came back, I just felt so content with what I had and all of the stuff that I just wanted to do with my life that god seemed ridiculous; literally the greatest stories ever told, to make people who are naturally concerned about the state of their lives in a disorderly world full of disorderly people feel as though their lives have a higher meaning, because this shitty place that hurts so much all of the time and causes so many people to suffer horribly can’t be all there is, is it?
Yes, yes it seems to be all there is, but deal with it, be excellent to each other, help out others whenever you can, and try to make the best of it while you can, because you never know when the moment will come when you’re over.
And amen JC, I totally dug the needling of the Catholic Church. The way that they are out there spinning this child buggery as a “media war” instead of just, I don’t know, humbly crawling to a higher power and confessing their sins and asking to be forgiven for the horrible acts to children that they are responsible for, and pay their penance. The nerve of folks to go around trying to make us non-believers feel bad about ourselves when Holy Mother Church, the Church from which all other christian churches spring from, has and is still condoning child buggery.
williamc
@Cat Lady:
Right on Cat Lady!
Late to the party as always, but its been a crap busy day, but whenever I hear of someone who came to “the end of that god-business” through an awesome trip, I know a kindred spirit is near. I had an LSD trip in my undergraduate days where I totally lost the path of sanity and eventually found my way back to it, though sometimes having to argue about verifiable history with a young gay wingnut at a bar in Atlanta makes me feel like I never really came back to sanity (Reagan did too raise taxes and increased the deficit!). I was so in my own mind during this trip that all of the questions that I had ever had about what life was about answered themselves and when I came back, I just felt so content with what I had and all of the stuff that I just wanted to do with my life that god seemed ridiculous; literally the greatest stories ever told, to make people who are naturally concerned about the state of their lives in a disorderly world full of disorderly people feel as though their lives have a higher meaning, because this shitty place that hurts so much all of the time and causes so many people to suffer horribly can’t be all there is, is it?
Yes, yes it seems to be all there is, but deal with it, be excellent to each other, help out others whenever you can, and try to make the best of it while you can, because you never know when the moment will come when you’re over.
And amen JC, I totally dug the needling of the Catholic Church. The way that they are out there spinning this child buggery as a “media war” instead of just, I don’t know, humbly crawling to a higher power and confessing their sins and asking to be forgiven for the horrible acts to children that they are responsible for, and pay their penance. The nerve of folks to go around trying to make us non-believers feel bad about ourselves when Holy Mother Church, the Church from which all other christian churches spring from, has and is still condoning child buggery.
arguingwithsignposts
@matoko_chan:
Nope. I don’t believe missionaries and evangelists have caused a whole hell of a lot more ills among non-whites than the politicians, kings and assorted snake-oil salespeople of their own skin color have. Remember, the caste system in India wasn’t set up by Christian missionaries. It wasn’t the Catholic Church that subjugated women in Islamic countries.
Evil is as evil does, whether it wears a clerical color or a prince’s crown.
r€nato
@matoko_chan:
The civil rights movement was very much church-based and was led, of course, by a preacher.
The anti-choice movement is very much church-based and is often led by religious figures like Pat Robertson (a former preacher) and Catholic clergy.
Discuss.
r€nato
@matoko_chan:
and your typical anti-choice zealot will argue that fetii have rights, too, because God told them so.
matoko_chan
And I might be your enemy, Adam…..thus..
“The clergy…believe that any portion of power confided to me [as President] will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me: and enough, too, in their opinion.” –Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Rush, 1800. ME 10:173
that is my oath too.
John Cole
Uh oh.
But yes.
A lot of people have a very hard time understanding that they just are not that really important in the big scheme of things, so we develop all sorts of coping mechanism.
Again, I don’t want to be cynical and upset a lot of people, all of whom are perfectly free to believe whatever they want, but one really good coping mechanism for this might be the belief that there is an omniscient and omnipotent diety who loves all of his subjects and has a grand plan for each of us despite the fact that he or she is notoriously cruel and seems to strike down those who worhip and those who do not with equal fervor. And that there is an eternal paradise waiting if you just worship this diety. And don’t have sex too young like every other species on the planet. Or eat meat on Friday! Or wear a condom! And priests shouldn’t have sex, because that would be bad and has nothing to do with the concern that the offspring of priests might take church property. Also, virgin birth.
I’m going to regret writing this comment.
John +5
J. Michael Neal
@matoko_chan:
I have taken my religion back, thank you very much. Christians don’t have some sort of special responsibility to argue with other, disagreeing Christians. *You* are just as responsible as they are for that convincing; you can decide what that level of responsibility is. Telling them that it is their responsibility to police other Christians really is no different than telling President Obama that he’s responsible for all black people.
matoko_chan
But Arguing, those kings and tyrants were their OWN bidness.
Not the result of nasty foreign meddling.
“I do not know that it is a duty to disturb by missionaries the religion and peace of other countries, who may think themselves bound to extinguish by fire and fagot the heresies to which we give the name of conversions, and quote our own example for it. Were the Pope, or his holy allies, to send in mission to us some thousands of Jesuit priests to convert us to their orthodoxy, I suspect that we should deem and treat it as a national aggression on our peace and faith.” –Thomas Jefferson to Michael Megear, 1823. ME 15:434
Adam Collyer
@matoko_chan:
They don’t define me, anymore than the Truthers define you, Liberal.
Of course, Truthers don’t define Liberals. Islamic terrorists don’t define Muslims. And right-wing Christianists who prance in the public square don’t define Christians.
jl
@J. Michael Neal:
I agree with J Michael Neal.
As I said above, different types of Christians live in different spiritual realms. Different groups have a totally different idea about what religion is.
arguingwithsignposts
@matoko_chan:
The peasant in me would say they are just as evil as the missionaries who attempted to force their beliefs upon those people. I am reminded of this sketch from Holy Grail.
Annie
And why is that? I am tired of supposed Christians on the right using religion to promote their corrupt policies and beliefs — including dumbing down education with their interjection of creationism and intelligent design into the science curriculum; revising US history to make all the founding fathers religious fanatics; professing their principle of limited government while insisting that government should adhere to and enforce their Christian beliefs; and equating patriotism with the belief that America is a Christian nation. Without the mantle of conservative Christianity, the Republican party would be seen for what it truly is — bankrupt.
I have nothing against true people of faith. But what accounts for religious belief these days has nothing to do with faith, and everything to do with position and power. And, Republicans use this tool quite well. Ms. Sarah is a perfect example. She wants Christian women to create a cover around her to protect her from media that dares question her intelligence and honesty. And, Christian women at the conference got on their feet and applauded her…Let’s see Jim Wallis try and appeal to a crowd to protect him from Christians that are the first to attack him for believing that religion and social justice go hand and hand….
If November goes well for the Republicans, it shows that they played the religious card well. Because we know that Obama is a secret Muslim and therefore can’t be a person of faith.
J. Michael Neal
@matoko_chan:
They only define him to a moron. Apparently, that includes you.
Ecks
@Alex: Mizzou, brother Jed, word!
As for Chet, Mikey and their ilk here, one message: You know how there is no proof for religion? And you know how smug that makes you feel to realize that other people are believing things for which there is no proof? Well here’s the newsflash: There’s no proof AGAINST God either. None. There is not a single experiment you could perform that can produce observable evidence that God does not exist. So your contempt for others beliefs is every bit as well founded on empirical proof as their belief in God is.
So in short, STFU. Word of advice here from a fellow atheist.
New Yorker
So if this is a religious-themed open thread, I’m going to mention that I really love the Netflix feature where you can watch certain movies instantly on your computer. Thus, I was able to watch “The Last Temptation of Christ”, and after digesting that bizarre, contemplative, and haunting flick, I needed a chaser, so I watched “Beavis and Butt-head Do America” (which is still as hilarious as it was when it came out when I was 17).
On the topic of “Temptation”, I think its only major flaw was casting a blond-haired, blue-eyed Jesus. I don’t think Scorsese was doing anything intentionally racist, and I did like Willem Dafoe’s performance, but still, if you’re going to make a movie about middle easterners, the main character should really look middle eastern.
I definitely give the film credit for making it explicit that Jesus was executed as a political criminal by the Roman authorities, and not because an evil Jewish mob demanded it (like Mel Gibson would have us believe). David Bowie plays Pontius Pilate as the cold-blooded authoritarian the historic Pilate was believed to be, and there is no trial in front of the Sanhedrin, or a Jewish mob at all. If there is any truth to the Jesus story, this is probably how it went about.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@John Cole:
Don’t blame me if you regret it, I agree with you.
scudbucket
Religious belief is non-rational (everyone agrees on this), but it is characterized as irrational by athiests. This gets the believers all in a twitter because they perceive condescension in the phrasing. But how is it to be better phrased? Surely non-believers, being bound as they are for a tormented and very hot eternity, ought to be accorded some latitude by God’s chosen ones, especially given the restrictive limits language imposes when talking about spiritual matters. I mean, do you Christians really have to kick the atheist
Goddog when he is down like this?LD50
@mikey:
I’ve had exactly that discussion with an American Christian, on an evolution board. There was an aggressive female creationist from Kansas talking about how she’d ‘chosen’ to be a Christian. I pointed out that if she’d been born in Saudi Arabia, she’d be a Muslim, that it’s cultural norms, and that ‘choice’ has very little to do with it 99% of the time. She flipped the fuck out and got VERY angry. I guess she thought she’d somehow find a way to be a Southern Baptist even if she grew up in Riyadh.
matoko_chan
J. Michael Neal–
ekshually I don’t relly care…im definitely not a christian.
Not a fan, sowwy.
Tea Party Jesus is fine by me, because the Unified Force Theory of Tea Party Jesus is going to badly damage the movement….and permanently damage the christian brand..
:).
I think Adam should care, but that is his bidness.
/shrug
When the polls come out that show 99% of the Tea Party attendees self-describe as christian, and the TPM is wholly a religious sect, then moderates and independents will flee them like scalded cats.
Basically I just want to watch the teabaggers pivot from screaming “we are not racists the liberals are!” to screaming “we are not christians the liberals are!”…oops. ;)
Actually I think they will scream “we are not ALL christians….umm …we have atheists…..umm….buddhists….”
lawl.
handy
@New Yorker: I actually thought Harvey Keitel was an odd choice as Judas.
Comrade Kevin
@J. Michael Neal:
So, what, do you think that being a Black person is a personal choice? Your comparison is absurd.
demimondian
@r€nato: Interestingly, someone asked me just that the other day, in the context of having read Knuth’s response to the same question.
I basically take Knuth’s answer and embroider it. “I am a Christian because of the environment in which I grew up. I have no way of knowing how God would have revealed Himself to me had I grown up a different person, although it certainly seems reasonable that I’d have been Muslim in Iran, Sikh near Amritsar, or Buddhist in Tibet. I don’t know; I only know what I experienced in my life.”
It often surprises people who find those questions to be stumpers that those of us who don’t have actually entertained them and thought about them — and often see them as the puerile nonsense, not deep challenges.
J. Michael Neal
@scudbucket:
Well, keep in mind that some of us think that your first clause is wrong, and so your second doesn’t really follow. You get the same latitude everyone else does. Granted, since I’m going to be stuck sharing heaven with you for all eternity, I’m trying to be a little less abrasive.
I haven’t been entirely successful.
r€nato
@Ecks:
well now we are getting into epistemology. How do we know there is no Santa Claus? How do we know the sun will rise in the east?
If you are determined to split hairs, it is impossible to prove a negative. You can’t prove there is no God, nor Santa Claus, nor Tooth Fairy. Not definitively.
Therefore, the real Supreme Being could be a pink unicorn that shits ice cream and created the universe with a series of sharts after a long night of tequila shots followed up by eating a big, greasy burrito from Filiberto’s at 3am. That’s just as likely as the Biblical account of creation, as far as I am concerned.
I mean, perhaps God was so determined to mindfuck us humans into making sure that the only way to believe in him was pure blind faith, that he made sure to erase every last bit of evidence for his existence.
Richard Dawkins made the argument better than I. What we *can* say definitively, is that the odds of such things being true are so vanishingly small, that they can be regarded as untrue for practical purposes.
Paradoxically, I consider myself agnostic for the precise reason you cite; it’s rather arrogant to insist that there can’t be a Supreme Being of *any* kind. After all, humans know so little of the universe around us, even now. We’re only beginning to understand how much we don’t know about the universe at both the macro and quantum levels.
For all practical purposes, however, I’m likely closer to the atheist position. I’m fairly certain there’s no god of any sort, and that proof of such is about as unlikely as finding proof of the Tooth Fairy.
But I refuse to make that leap to categorical insistence that there is no god. It just seems very, very improbable to me.
hamletta
LD50, do you have any data that says it’s the moderates that are leaving, or are you just speculating? My mainline denom has dipped a bit over the last few years, but no more than the Southern Baptists.
As to people who make comments about “invisible sky fairies,” I just shrug them off, because a) they’re ignorant; b) they’re assholes. I just shake the dust off my sandals, because why bother?
LD50
So if I think that unicorns don’t exist, I’M the one being unreasonable? Gotcha.
RJ
I have no use for religion, and am honestly unsure whether the world does either anymore. As for denigrating others’ beliefs, when the belief is, for lack of a more nuanced word, stupid, I don’t see why it can’t (or even shouldn’t) be denigrated.
For example, if you want to believe the world is less than 10,000 years old, I guess you have the right, but that doesn’t mean you are right. An easily disproved belief like that ought to be ridiculed, no matter how fervently the believer wants it to be true.
But I sure as hell won’t denigrate something wonderful like `do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’
matoko_chan
Like I have explained before…Neal….appearance is reality.
Tea Party Jesus is visible christianity.
He’s the one on the cover of the magazines, and on the terebi.
And I don’t care….as far as I’m concerned, Tea Party Jesus could be the real one.
He seems to have more vocal supporters.
J. Michael Neal
@Comrade Kevin: No, I think that it’s idiotic and offensive to insist that someone has a particular responsibility for someone else just because of shared membership in a very large, very diverse set of people. Adam has explained his views. Beyond that, he has no more responsibility than you do for what other Christians believe or do.
There are some instances in which someone has particular responsibility for someone else in some set of people, but they always involve more formal lines of authority.
arguingwithsignposts
@LD50:
Calvinism is her friend.
handy
LOLs. Winner!
Randy P
@matoko_chan: Tea Party EVERYTHING is more vocal. So they win politics too?
Now you’re just being silly.
J. Michael Neal
@r€nato:
This is simply incorrect. The odds of such things being true are unknowable. There’s nothing wrong with choosing to behave as if they are not true; at some point, in the face of the unknowable, we all have to move forward in some fashion. Don’t confuse that with having any knowledge as to the prior probabilities.
Really, this claim isn’t any different from the creationists arguing that evolution couldn’t have happened, because what we see before us is so improbable. It moves the opposite direction down the same false path, but it makes the same error. We don’t know.
Annie
@LD50:
Exactly. I love the case of the troubled young girl in Ohio who ran away from her Muslim parents and straight into the arms of a Christian community. She has become a “cause” of conservative Christians, who believe they are saving her from death. It seems that Muslim parents kill their children when they misbehave. She told the Christians that it is stated in the Koran…The Christian community is paying her legal fees to keep her from her parents…all in the name of Christianity. Why? Because she is now “born again.”
Imagine if a Christian young girl ran away from home straight into the arms of a Muslim family….
matoko_chan
Oh yes they do.
Appearance is reality.
Tea Party Jesus is the one on the magazines and on tv.
He is the one telling Sarah Palin what to do, and the media hangs breathless on her every word.
Tea Party Jesus is becoming the christian brand.
He’s official.
lawl.
Ecks
@Kevin: Kevin, nobody can or should MAKE you respect other people’s deeply held beliefs, but it makes you a much nicer and more civil human being if you do.
Or lives in a corporate office with a logo.
Also, whatever happened to the American national narrative of this country being founded by pilgrims escaping religious persecution… by other Christians. The puritans had to flee because they were the wrong brand of Christianity, and the other ones weren’t inclined to put up with their perceived heresy (plus apparently they really WERE pretty darn annoying). So the founders explicitly said that no religion gets to hold secular power, because once they do they have an alarming tendency to go about persecuting all the other religions that disagree with them.
demimondian
@r€nato: So let’s talk about odds, Renato?
How likely are *you*? Can you provide me with any Bayesian prior which makes you in any way more likely than the supreme Pink Unicorn? Obviously, then, you don’t exist.
You do realize, don’t you, that Bayes’ Law was promulgated by the Rev. Thomas Bayes, right? And that Gregor Mendel was Br. Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian monk? And that the pre-eminent text on Evolutionary Genetics is still the text by Francisco Ayala — That’d be Fr. Franciso Ayala, S.J., Ph.D., of the University of California, Irvine?
Do you honestly think that Dawkins is asking questions which haven’t been answered — roundly — a thousand times before?
Ruckus
@williamc:
Yes, yes it seems to be all there is, but deal with it, be excellent to each other, help out others whenever you can, and try to make the best of it while you can, because you never know when the moment will come when you’re over.
Some days life just sucks. But the alternative? Never seeing that sunrise, your breath on a cold day, trees hundreds of years old, hell the grand canyon, your loved ones, your pets you’ve picked up shit for, SEX, helping out someone for the pure pleasure… OK I see these are not necessarily in the correct order.
What the hell, I’ll give it another day.
We voted for hope because that’s what we have, the hope tomorrow will bring us one of those days, the better days, the days that make us happy to be alive. People who can’t see what they have always want more, always want what they can’t see because it may be better that what they have. Someone else is happy and I can’t be happy unless I have what they have. God is better than this, the afterlife has got to be better than this. This is a shitty place, this can’t be all there is.
Except, it is.
And it’s pretty damn good already if you’re willing to get your head out of the sand and look around and make it better for all instead of only better for one’s self.
.
matoko_chan
Randy P.
The teabaggers are defining modern christianity.
Volume works there.
Tea Party Jesus is becoming the official brand.
They would like to define politics……fortunately, they can’t turn volume into votes.
:)
RJ
@Annie:
Or imagine if the Christians actually followed those verses about stoning your son if he displeases you.
matoko_chan
J Micheal Neal……IDC!!!
As far as im concerned, Tea Party Jesus can be the real one.
Adam calls them christianists, but they call themselves christians.
It is all the same as far as im concerned……but if Adam doesn’t want Tea Party Jesus to become the official version, he better speak now or forever hold his “piece”.
lawl.
ca m’ete egal.
LD50
@hamletta:
I have read several times that in the US as a whole, liberal and moderate denominations are shrinking, and that conservative denominations are growing, both in absolute numbers and as a percentage of all believers. I don’t have citations to hand, but I can try digging sth up if you can’t find anything.
Ecks
@r€nato:
Everything you say is true, but here’s the actually important bit: Who cares? If someone believes in Santa Claus, what’s so wrong with that? You and I can do our multivariate calculus and decide that while of course we can’t be 100% definitive, the balance of probabilities are very very strongly in our favor, but they get to believe that a big guy in a red suit will bring them stuff. Sounds pretty good to me.
And let’s face it, all of us believe things that we can’t PROVE for sure. We believe that our mothers love us, that our partners are faithful, that we’re not going to die tomorrow at the hands of a drunk driver, and that our boss is not plotting to fire us. Some of those will be right, some will be wrong (for some of us), and we can never really know any of them for sure. But we’re generally much better off believing them anyway.
Or maybe you’re just the sort of jackhole who enjoys going to preschool and shouting “Your parents put the boxes under the tree!”
UPDATE:
So you think unicorns don’t exist. Good for you. Ain’t no gotcha involved.
handy
@matoko_chan:
What puzzles me are the ones who hold up the bible and a copy of Atlas Shrugged. You got one book where Jesus says: “Love your enemies, put others before you” while the other has the ethos: “I’ve got mine, F- You!”
Not to mention Ayn Rand wasn’t shy about her disdain for religion. Talk about your cognitive dissonance.
Ruckus
@Ecks:
Also, whatever happened to the American national narrative of this country being founded by pilgrims escaping religious persecution… by other Christians. The puritans had to flee because they were the wrong brand of Christianity, and the other ones weren’t inclined to put up with their perceived heresy (plus apparently they really WERE pretty darn annoying).
Said it before, the puritans were not leaving to escape religious persecution, they were leaving to practice it.
Ecks
@Annie: She would be able to make the same case. Leviticus says that you must kill your son if he is disobedient.
Oh wait, it’s a she. I guess she gets off on a technicality then.
Ecks
@RJ: Ah, you beat me to it!
matoko_chan
handy, religion is non-rational.
The Tea Party movement is a religious movement, not a political one.
It is a grievance movement of conservative christianity.
Their cognitive dissonance is also exemplified in medicare recipients protesting government healthcare. Medicare IS government healthcare.
demimondian
@Ruckus: Actually, the history is even more complicated than that.
The Plymouth Brethren were actually pretty tolerant. They had to be; there weren’t enough of them to fill a ship. In fact, Plimouth Plantation was pretty good to white folk, in general; never mind them uppity Injuns. They’d been basically put on the boat because the merchants who’d funded them were tired of it, and wanted them to make their own way, and…well, they deserved it.
The real religious bigots came in the second wave. They settled Boston, and were a lot more successful than the folks down south.
Fern
@LD50: I don’t have data handy either, but this phenomenon is not limited to the US. For example, Pentecostal churches are doing very well these days in South America.
joeyess
How about this: Fuck Religion. And all it entails. To me, religion is nothing more than superstition, wrapped in mysticism, cloaked in morality and bereft of reason. There, I said it. And I’m not backing down.
Nothing is “sacred” because “sacred” is a bogus word based in irrational thought.
And yes, I will quote P.Z. Myers”:
r€nato
@Ecks:
I’m pretty sure I stated up above that I generally keep my notions about the ridiculousness of belief in a supreme being, to myself.
In fact, I’m certain of it.
arguingwithsignposts
check, test?
mikey
@Ecks:
Seriously? You want me to ‘STFU’ because the BEST argument you can muster is I can’t “PROVE” you’re wrong?
Why the christian pushback against evolution then? What about the “god of the gaps”?
What universal question have we asked that we need a supernatural answer to explain? We understand the formation of the universe, the birth of stars, the incredible panorama of biodiversity, the way the solar system evolved and the magic of DNA and you think we should “STFU” and accept some kind of ‘god did it’ answer?
That’s beyond obscene. If there was a real god, he’d punish YOU….
mikey
LD50
@Ecks: And today’s exhibit in Missing The Point, we have…
arguingwithsignposts
OK, for some reason, WP eats anything with a link to the Pew Forum on religion and american life. there’s some stats there about religious affiliation for those who are interested. Google it, and FYWP.
Ecks
@joeyess: You forgot the part that goes:
If you are going to taunt someone pointlessly and to no constructive end you might as well do it with style.
LD50
@Fern:
Yup. My wife teaches at an inner city school in California which is half Hispanic. She’s told me that over HALF of her Hispanic kids’ families aren’t Catholic, but either Pentecostal or Baptist. Her take on it is that Hispanics like going to a church that doesn’t tell married couples that they’re going to hell for using birth control.
mclaren
@General Crackpot Fake Name:
Not a big grammar fan, though.
themann1086
It’s not blogwhoring if it’s someone else’s blog, right?
“You Can’t Disprove Religion”: 3 Counterexamples. A sample:
Eh I don’t wanna take up any more space than I already did (might go in and edit out some stuff if it looks too large), read the rest if you want. Edited to remove intro paragraphs.
Ecks
@r€nato: Well glad to hear it.
(erg, I can never keep straight who said what in these things)
@mikey:
LOL, you’re very funny. Here’s your argument shorter:
“Science has proved A B and C, therefore D is wrong!”
See the flaw here?
“You say that your mother loves you, but nuh uh, because science has PROVEN that the solar system isn’t the only galaxy in the universe!”
Science is the domain of the observable. God is not observable. Therefore science has nothing to say about God, one way or the other. Not pro, not con, not sideways, not backwards. God and science are just different questions.
So believe in God, or don’t believe in God, either way. But if you start coming in here trying to tell me that science has dis-proven God, then all you’ve proved is that you don’t know much about science.
joeyess
@Ecks: I read no refutation of my claim, there.
I’m taunting no one. Merely expressing my 1st amendment rights and calling bullshit when I see it. Personally, I think that religion and the religious should be verbally persecuted at every given opportunity. They sure as hell have a way of creeping into every neighborhood and every local, state and national political event in this country. All tax free by the way.
So, in short, I’ll say it again: Fuck Religion.
And it’s whiney, persecution complex.
LD50
Neither are unicorns, I guess.
joeyess
@LD50: that’s why no one really believes in unicorns, either.
Ecks
@joeyess: Sure. It is their legal right to believe what they want, and your legal right to be a douche about it to whoever you like.
All I’m suggesting is that your act would be a little less grating if you made it funnier, or somehow more original. That’s not a legal demand, just a request from one passenger on this crazy planet to another. It’s my right to ask as well :)
cay
how you keep a blog like this going is beyond me. you put yourself out there for all to see, and they nitpick at your beliefs or non-beliefs. your response, JC, is brilliant. kudos.
r€nato
@Ecks:
Richard Dawkins – once again – likely explained it best, but I’ll take a whack at it.
Science deals in empiricism. Religion, by definition, sets itself up as being outside empiricism and claims that reason is insufficient. One simply must believe.
That’s all well and good; as humans, we have to take certain things on faith at one time or another.
But when push comes to shove, I’m going to take science and reason before religion and anti-reason. Science has proven its superiority over metaphysical belief, over and over and over again. I won’t claim that religion has never led to anything good; some of the greatest works of art and architecture have been religiously-inspired, for instance.
However, religion has led mankind astray far more often than not. Humans, quite frankly, lived in filth and the majority of mankind lived in brutal, nasty conditions because of our inability to put sufficient effort into reason, which in turn leads to science and then technology. It was considered an offense against God, for instance, to dissect a human body in order to learn more about what makes us tick. I’m pretty sure Leonardo da Vinci was one of the first, if not the first, to learn about what actually makes humans tick by dissecting bodies.
Modern-day religious moralists would prevent us from advancing human wellbeing because of their fetus fetish.
Conversely, while science has been misused to evil ends over time, it’s undeniable that the general advancement in humankind’s well-being over the last few centuries are almost entirely due to a revolution in thinking about reason and science – starting with the Renaissance and then later, the Enlightenment – rather than any sort of revolution in religion and metaphysics.
LD50
@Ecks: Might I suggest that based on your posts, there is no reason to view you as an expert on how to make expressing one’s opinion funny, convincing, original, or nongrating to other people?
SectarianSofa
@stuckinred:
Yep — I’m with Cole and Aimai on this one.
I tried reading the thread, but the plodding tendentiousness got to me after about #(I don’t know, pick a number, I’m not going back up there).
Also, PZ is a jackass. I’m glad the SuperAthiests-who-hate-stupid-people have a mascot though. (I do read him sometimes when the Jesus Dinosaur People depress me too much.)
Ecks
@LD50: Surely nobody has observed one, you are correct.
But let’s make this interesting. Say you have a neighbor who sincerely believes that they do exist. Let’s say it’s really important to her, that sometimes in her spare time she rents the whitest horse she can find, straps a horn to its head, and rides around feeling the troubles of the world drop away from her. Then so what?
Or maybe she believes that her father who she never met loves her. Or maybe she believes that it is really important that she preserve her virginity, and this is somehow a source of identity and meaning for her? Would you mock those beliefs? To her face? They aren’t provable either.
You have a legal right to say any damn stupid thing you want, but on some occasions we are better people when we have some discretion to whom we say them.
arguingwithsignposts
And so this is why I have come to loathe the religion threads. They degenerate – slowly or rapidly – into a pissing match between believers who feel looked down upon and atheists/agnostics who feel the desire to do the religion troll thing (I’m looking at several of you at once here).
And none of it resolves anything.
Speaking as someone who spent several years as a fundamentalist, and then switched sides to agnosticism, I see both viewpoints, but don’t find the back-and-forth particularly edifying. I still dig talking about religious belief, and the history of religions, and respect those who hold different views (as long as those views don’t seek to shove religion down my throat).
There’s a shitload of stuff that progressive/liberal believers and atheists/agnostics can agree upon and work toward changing. That’s what we should focus on, imho.
tl;dr – can’t we all just get along?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@mclaren: Are we going to have to throw a net over your sorry ass Mclaren. Haven’t you made enough of an obnoxious ass out of yourself tonight, you fucking psycho.
mclaren
@LD50:
Except for, you know, that little electing the president and the majority of the members of both houses of congress thing.
But apparently in your universe that qualifies as “almost no political power.”
That’s the fallacy of the excluded middle. The spinelessness and fecklessness of most liberals doesn’t explain all the trouble country is in.
But it does explain a lot of the trouble this country is in.
Fair enough. Let’s start with deficits.
I seem to recall a Democratic congress french-kissing Saint Ronnie’s bunghole and going along with his atrocious tax cuts for the rich back in the early 80s. Or was I just imagining that?
Moving on to “deficits – part deux,” I also appear to recall the democrats cringing and whimpering and voting for the Drunk-Driving C Student’s three-trillion-dollar war in Iraq back in 2002. Or was that just an ugly rumor?
And then we have the Republican’s budget-busting medicare supplement for drug benefits, for which (repeat after me) the spineless craven Democrats voted once again.
There seems to be a pattern here, doesn’t there?
Moving on to “violence,” I recall almost all the Democrats in congress voting to authorize chimpy and his torturing murdering buddies to go torture and murder a million or so innocent civilians in Iraq. Do you remember that? Ring a bell? Sound like “violence” to you? Shock and awe? Yes? Starting to come back to you yet?
As far as “war” goes, I think we’ve just covered that, so let’s move on to “poverty.” Do you recall the Democrats acting as a united block to filibuster every piece of legislation that came through congress until the minimum wage was lifted to a decent level? No? Neither do I.
If the goddamn liberals in America had shown one millionth of the ferocity in obstructing Republican efforts to bust unions and crush the average working stiff that the Republicans have shown over the last 2 years in opposing Obama’s reforms, this country wouldn’t have any poverty.
If the goddamn Democrats in this country has put out one tenth of the frenzied opposition to the illegal immoral unprovoked war of aggression against Iraq that the Republicans had put into opposing health care reform, America wouldn’t have dared to send one platoon into Baghdad.
Moving on to “health care crisis,” can you say “Obama promised not to sign a bill without a public option” — and then he signed it. Way to show some backbone, Barack. Go, liberals!
And as for “environmental degradation,” I seem to recall the fucking liberals caving and crawling like insects when chimpy and company decided to dump the Kyoto treaty. Yes, the liberals have stood tall and whimpered like heroes, begging and crawling in abject obeisance.
So yes, basically. A whole goddamn lot of the monumental clusterfvck that is the last 30 years of violence and poverty and war and torture and mass murder and health care crisis is exactly and precisely the fault of the crawling cringing spineless liberals. They didn’t cause these problems but they sure as hell aided and abetted ’em.
So pardon the fuck out of me for considering the assholes who drove the getaway car almost as guilty as the smash-and-grab Republican bank robbers themselves, thank you very much.
arguingwithsignposts
@r€nato:
Yes, because science has never had to correct itself (cough, lobotomy, cough).
mclaren
@General Crackpot Fake Name:
You’re deepened the discussion with your customary insight.
mikey
@Ecks:
Once more, then I’m giving up on you, kid.
No one can “PROVE” you’re wrong. As long as you are happy clinging to THAT as the supporting argument for your worldview, fine, vaya con dios as they say. Personally, I like to hold my worldview to a more exacting standard.
So you go on and duck the hard questions. Hell, why bother doing any research when everyone knows GOD did it. Malaria? What? That turned out to be a disease? Polio? Why bother, y’know? What? A vaccine? Wow, who coulda known. Wait, I’m hearing voices from the heavens. Oh. It’s just the FM radio.
C’mon, kid. Open your mind. It’s the 21st century. You can hide in the weeds and demand that someone disprove your sad fairy tales and just so stories, or you can just walk out into the light. But hey, it’s up to you…
mikey
joeyess
@Ecks: I don’t find anything funny about religion. I think it’s dangerous. Humor has been tried. And religion keeps on coming.
I’m out.
I believe the time has come to be as irreverent as possible. This world is dangerous enough as it is. We don’t need to add religion to the nukular mix.
What we need is reason and rationality.
I refuse to humor this nonsense any longer.
Sorry, the jokes are old and tired.
And so is showing deference to the delusional.
themann1086
@Ecks: oo fun, we got the “who are you to take away people’s favorite delusions” coupled with a “Science can’t prove love”.
Carl Sagan has a nice chapter on this issue (unicorns and Gods and what-not), from Demon-Haunted World: Science As A Candle In The Dark, called (IIRC) “The Invisible Dragon In My Garage”. I’d recommend reading it. And the whole book. And every book by Sagan.
r€nato
@arguingwithsignposts:
Science is generally self-correcting; try looking up ‘the scientific method’.
On the other hand, religion insists that it always has the Eternal, Unerrant, Never-Changing Truth About Everything.
Until it doesn’t, in which case… hey, look over there! Gays want to get married! O Noes!
If science was run like religion, we’d STILL be lobotomizing people and doctors would consider it ‘heresy’ to suggest that it might not be a good idea.
handy
Every time I read a McLaren post I keep thinking of the line “Don’t shoot shoot shoot that thing at me!” from Add It Up by Violent Femmes.
LD50
@mclaren:
If you think Obama and Congress are ‘liberals’, I doubt I can reason with you.
Fern
@mikey: The one question I have though, is why there is something (or the appearance of something) instead of nothing.
arguingwithsignposts
@r€nato:
Well, some religions think that. OTOH, there have been scientists who treat science as a religion. And those people who were lobotomized? Ask them about that self-correcting stuff.
ETA:
Lobotomies fell out of favor in the 1960s. I agree with the scientific method, but we tend to give far too much credence to some stuff that gets trotted out as “science.”
Ecks
@LD50: Suggest away.
@r€nato: Point me to one place where I have suggested that science was anything less than an extremely useful thing. If you want to know how diodes work, go get a physics textbook. If you want to feel uplifted by a cathedral or art or a communion ceremony or one of those buddhist cymbals that ring for like 15 minutes, then I’ve seen nothing in a biology or psychology or any other ology textbook that says you can’t be.
But to engage more directly, Dawkins tries to set up this binary whereby religion is somehow the opposite of science. That’s just kind of silly. Yes, sometimes religious authorities impeded science or denied its findings. But sometimes other authorities and moral sentiments slowed science down too. Anatomists learned a fair bit by digging up bodies from graveyards and dissecting them, and a lot of people think this is gross and objectionable for entirely non-religious reasons. In fact, morality as a whole is a separate question that science. Science tells you in great deal what the consequences are if you plunge an ice pick into someone’s head, but it tells you nothing about whether you should do it or not. Science tells you about “is” and “will,” but not “should.”
And likewise, when seatbelts were first invented it turns out that lots of people loudly announced that they were stupid because in the event of a crash you were obviously much safer being “thrown clear.” There was nothing religious at all about that particular bit of stupid science denialism, just people feeling grumpy about being made to wear an entirely uncouth strap about their body. In fact, one of the biggest forces to oppose scientific discoveries have been other scientists who didn’t like their old theories being overturned.
Science can even be used to describe faith. But it is simply a false dichotomy to say that one has to be chosen over the other.
burnspbesq
@matoko_chan:
OK, you’ve now said the same thing seven different ways, and it’s still no sale.
I define me. No one else does,
Those who have perverted Christ’s teachings in the service of a profoundly un-Christian social and political agenda don’t have to answer to me.
They will, however, have to answer to God someday.
LD50
@Ecks:
I have no idea how we arrived at that from this, which is what I took exception to in the first place:
I’ve never mocked anyone to their face for their religious beliefs and I doubt I ever will, but the statement “your contempt for others beliefs is every bit as well founded on empirical proof as their belief in God is” is simply ridiculous.
Jennifer
Hmmmm. In a similar vein, I just put up a post about some very creepy P*niskeeper dolls over at my joint.
mikey
@Fern:
That’s incoherent. We can look around at what IS, and ask questions about it. If you want to know WHY, you’re asking an incoherent question and I suggest you stick with a magical answer, Fern.
God put it all here.
Have fun. Good night…
mikey
joeyess
@Ecks
That statement smacks of Rumsfeld’s ” Absense of evidence doesn’t mean evidence of absense”….
Utter. Fucking. Bullshit. Argument.
I now know why this country was so easily led to a useless war in Iraq. Simply put, a lot of people were bamboozled…….easily,
Ecks
@mikey: My my kid, you seem to have a poor handle on reality here.
1) I’m not religious at all.
2) Religion, except in the case of a few whack jobs, is not an alternative to science. The Catholics have a dogma of separate magesteria: Science is the realm of the physical magesteria – the observable with malaria and anvils and such. Religion is the realm of the spiritual magesteria – the unobservable and ineffable. Stephen Jay Gould and E. O. Wilson have both written about this dogma in pretty glowing terms, so yes, there are a bunch of extremely successful and famous scientists who are quite happy with it, so if you want to argue, go take it up with them.
3) Telling people to go fuck themselves is generally obnoxious. In some cases richly deserved (nobody here is overly fond of the Christianist fucks who want to conduct all of our lives according to their personal religious beliefs. I have a hearty amen for your middle fingers when it comes to those guys). In other cases not so much (y’know, like, say, the unitarians, or the non-fundamentalist scientists who do research all week, and then go to church for enlightenment on Sunday). Nobody is forcing you to discriminate between those two groups, but pretty please, with sugar on top, would you please start, please?
Ecks
@LD50: Ok, fair enough.
I think where I started off is getting annoyed at the people who were saying (in so many words) “haha, science has disproven God,” and then using this as their launching point for accusing all religious people of being off their rocker irrational. Science has proven no such thing, nor can it prove any such thing. I say this as a scientist. I spend my days trying to prove things. There is no experiment I could possibly dream up that would get into a peer-reviewed journal for establishing anything about God at all, one way or the other.
Winston Smith
@John Cole:
I don’t know if you’ll see this buried in among the imbeciles arguing whether science or religion have the bigger penis, but as a theist, I knew what you meant.
As they say at SomethingAwful, the Internet makes you stupid — and sadly, that applies even to your fine readership.
Fern
@mikey: Making some incorrect assumptions about my faith or lack of it, there.
And I don’t see that asking “why” is a problem. People tend to try and create meaning with respect to themselves and the world they live in. I think that is (in part) where the religious impulse comes from. I don’t believe that the answer to “why” is god. But I can see why people might come to that conclusion.
Ecks
@joeyess:
If you want to put your logician hat on, this statement is actually true. For gods sake, there are so many ACTUAL reasons to hate Rumsfeld. The man has spewed destructive lie after immoral edict, and your bash on him is that he accurately cited a logical dictum?
Look, here’s the difference: When you are faced with choosing whether to believe something you can’t prove (e.g., “God exists,” or “my mother loves me,” or “Iraq has WMDs”), then you have to start asking yourself, what are the stakes if I’m wrong. What if I falsely believe my mother loves me? Then I probably live a better life. What if I falsely believe there is a God and She loves me? Then I probably live a better life. What if I falsely believe Iraq has WMDs? Then I start a useless and illegal war and hundreds of thousands of innocent people die.
So perhaps it’s clear why one’s standard of proof might vary just a little bit between these cases?
burnspbesq
@Ecks:
Exactly, and that points directly to the reason why the only rational position is tolerance for a diversity of views. Nobody knows anything. And those like joeyess who think they do are guilty of the worst kind of hubris.
joeyess
@Ecks: Ahhhh….. Pascal’s Wager.
The last refuge of a shallow philosophy.
So, your “faith” is merely covering your ass?
Weak Tea.
Waitress?? Check, please!
burnspbesq
@Ecks:
Have to pick one tiny nit with your response to joeyess (which was far more patient and tolerant than he has earned). I think you meant to say “erroneously” rather than “falsely.” Other than that, you hit it out of the park.
Mr Furious
@John Cole:
I don’t regret the big smile on my face while reading that comment, John, so don’t regret writing it.
I’m with you 110%. I walked away from the Catholic church when I went to college and never looked back. Have no use whatsoever for organized religion of any stripe.
I also have no use for the phrase “FSM” / “Flying Spaghetti Monster,” or instances when people are too clever by half when they go out of their way to substitute a common expression for a stupid inside joke. I find it intensely dorky and annoying.
I also have no use for people who are aggressively atheist: Getting in people’s faces and openly acting superior in your beliefs and judging others treads mighty close to behaving like a religious person yourself.
Everybody mind their fucking business. That, I can worship.
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
I’ll take care of that check. The sooner you leave, the better.
joeyess
@burnspbesq: Oh, I doubt very highly that it’s the worst kind of hubris.
Are you sure about that?
Faitheists just have thin skin when it comes to their delusion.
I don’t blame them. If I believed in something completely unprovable, I’d be a little defensive too.
mikey
@Fern:
I don’t know if I was making any assumptions at all. Someone who asks the comment thread on a political blog in the middle of the night for an explanation of “Why” the universe exists isn’t going to get a lot of deference, y’know?
There is nothing, not anything, that can answer that question. You can go with god, or descartes, or david lynch. Whatever you like – you can’t even ask the question in a coherent fashion.
“Why” is a question of motivation – by it’s nature it assumes there is a ‘reason’ for something. Now, if you are seeking the ‘reason’ the universe exists, that leads down some pretty irrationally anthropomorphic paths. The universe isn’t a set of legos. Why is that rock here, instead of THERE? Why do we breath oxygen? And what’s with all the freakin CARBON, anyway?
13 and a half billion years ago the universe formed. Stars created metals, which led to habitable planets and life, which evolved in our case to intelligence. It happened – but it never for a second needed a ‘reason’ to do so…
mikey
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
I am secure in my beliefs.
You don’t seem to be, or you wouldn’t be lashing out the way you are.
mcd410x
i just don’t care
but either way, there’s just no reason to be an asshat
joeyess
@Mr Furious:
I’ll buy that.
However, there’s just that little matter of wingnuts and their penchant for peddling of their wares and influencing policy that I feel requires a bit of pushback.
Well, maybe a little more than a “bit”.
burnspbesq
To clarify: “secure in my beliefs” doesn’t mean that I am never in doubt. Thoughtful religious people are perpetually in doubt. But I am able to resolve my doubts.
joeyess
@burnspbesq: noooo….. are you sure it’s the “worst kind of hubris..”?
I can think of a few worsts.
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
You and I are in complete agreement on that point. Where you’ve gone astray is in believing that all people of faith are wingnuts, and any wingnuts are genuinely Christian.
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
Well, you’re absolutely convinced of something that’s absolutely unknowable. I think that fits the dictionary definition of hubris.
Ecks
[snipping accidental repeated posting]
@burnspbesq: Thanks. And I’m sure you are correct on the “falsely” vs. “erroneously” thing, but… um… what is the difference? Do I take it that “falsely” refers to definitive falsehood while “erroneously” refers to unknowable measurement error?
mikey
@joeyess:
Not to mention the fact that religion is demonstrably dangerous, while empiricism – not so much. My response to the ‘live and let live’ crowd:
How many atheist suicide bombers do you see? When was the last time an atheist murdered an abortion provider, or a cartoonist, or a rape victim?
Those atheist crusades, man, that was some bad shit, huh?
Sorry, not buying any of the attempts to silence me. I see religion as one of the existential threats to humanity, and while I acknowledge that I have very little hope of making a dent in it, I’m not going to declare that you can believe what you want. Because as near as I can tell, it’s not a real long path from being a god botherer and being David Koresh or Tim McVeigh or Scott Roeder or Mohammed Atta or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Ariel Sharon. So, y’know, it’s all fun and games ’til somebody loses a loved one…
mikey
Ecks
@mikey: Err… You do realize that soviet Russia and Communist China were(are) both officially atheist? In fact, that they aggressively suppressed religion? Do you want the body count to go with them? It gets to a couple of million innocents before you even get past Stalin (see, f’rinstance, his genocide in Ukraine).
But don’t let the facts get in the way of a perfectly good rant now.
J. Michael Neal
@r€nato:
Superior at what? Very clearly, there are some things for which science is much better at giving us an answer than religion is. However, there are other things that science can’t answer at all. Scientific attempts to explain aesthetics can be useful as a starting point, but don’t really get to the heart of the matter. Science is, frankly, terrible as a basis for morality; most of the attempts to use it as such actually have quite different underpinnings that the expostulater is trying to ignore. I’ve become more religious over time, because my radical skepticism is useful to me in many ways (note the present tense), but that is was deeply unsatisfying in others. To each his own.
Not really. The main reason for living in such squalor and filth was because we were starting from such a poor economic base. On top of that, the most catastrophic event in European development really had nothing to do with religion, namely the collapse of the Roman Empire. (I could put together an argument that it was actually hastened along by the weakness of religion; the Roman state religion really was a complete pile of useless crap that didn’t satisfy anyone.)
I will certainly agree that the application of Christianity hindered scientific development at certain times. In others, not so much. More importantly, there’s a real question of short term and long term benefits. One thing that a lot of people seem to leave out when they are analyzing the costs and value of religion is that it really does provide emotional and spiritual solace to many of its believers. Would we have advanced more quickly in the late medieval period without it? Maybe, though I’m not sure even of this; to the extent that religion provided a basis that kept civilization together, we wouldn’t have had much progress without it. However, its absence would have made even more miserable the lives of a lot of people who had plenty of misery already.
Many of the social aspects of religion are no longer as necessary any more, at least for those who are provided a good education and a certain level of prosperity. *You* have the opportunity to seek out meaningful answers to life’s questions through other approaches. This was not possible for the vast majority of the medieval population, and remains impossible for a lot of the rest of the population.
It’s a balancing act. There are certainly ways in which the benefits derived from religion can, and often do, go hand in hand with the costs. Unlike you, I’m not prepared to say that I know for sure what the right answer was for everyone throughout history.
joeyess
@burnspbesq:
I never said that. I said that the religious are delusional. And, furthermore, I believe that those very delusions and the irrational thinking that often accompanies it can lead to horrible acts.
I have yet, in my lifetime, to read a headline like this: Atheist Accused of Planting Bombs in Churches.
And I doubt I ever will.
joeyess
@mikey: absolutely.
Ecks
@joeyess: I hope your math skills improve before you try paying that check, for the sake of your waitress, if nobody else.
Pascal’s wager: “you’re better off believing in God, because otherwise you might go to hell.”
Me: “It’s best to think about the consequences of your actions.”
Now I cannot prove that you are in fact a real person, rather than just a particularly inane web script written by a self-important undergraduate who has coded something like:
if (/*.probability*.god/g) {print “Ahhhh….. Pascal’s Wager.”}
According to me, I should weigh up the consequences of being wrong and decide they aren’t so bad, and so feel comfortable still believing you are a human.
According to you, believing something that is impossible to prove is the height of stupidity, in which case I should stop talking to you.
So, are you right?
joeyess
@Ecks:
Ecks
@joeyess: I can’t find a fire bombed church with my cursory search, but I do have this:
So can I read torture and massacre in as equivalent to church bombings, or do I have to keep searching?
burnspbesq
@Ecks:
I may be overthinking the distinction, but I characterize a belief in something that isn’t correct as “erroneous” rather than “false” because the believer really does believe it. In that sense, the belief is true – it exists – but it’s incorrect, because what is believed can be shown not to exist.
For example, I may believe that the top light on traffic lights is green if I suffer from red-green color-blindness, but it’s not – it’s red. My belief is “true” in the sense that it is sincerely and honestly held, but I am objectively wrong to believe it.
Does that make any sense?
Ecks
@joeyess: Oh really? From that same page:
Who knew, they weren’t so high on the opium of the masses.
joeyess
@Ecks: That wasn’t done in the name of “atheism” and you know it. It was done in the “defense of the Revolution”.
The same tactics were applied to farmers for hoarding food.
Swing and miss!
Like I said before:
Ecks
@burnspbesq: Hm. I guess. I’d have thought that a belief can both exist, and endorse a statement that is false, making it a false belief… Though I guess maybe you could confuse it with something that I didn’t REALLY believe (as in it is the fact of my belief that is false), but… I’m not sure anybody would really interpret it that way… Though “erroneous” certainly does allow for zero confusion, so maybe it’s better. Dunno :)
Dollared
John – don’t get beat down. You opened the door to a great discussion. You were absolutely clear. You closed the loop with the quote from Aimee, and that is soooo strong.
All you liberal/left Christians, heal thy churches. Stand up in those churches and be counted.
I stand up at work, surrounded by angry privileged white men. You can do it at your church – and leave us alone.
joeyess
@Ecks: I advocate none of that, and you know it.
your argument is specious. You’re equating my desire for us to shed our need for religion in favor of reason by raising a state decree of Stalin’s???
What the fuck is the matter with you?
Isn’t there some equivalent of Godwin’s Law to apply here?
You can’t handle someone questioning your faith and you offer Pascal’s Wager. When that fails you go right to Stalin.
WTF?
joeyess
@Dollared: yep
Ecks
@joeyess: Err… you see the bit I pasted in which reads:
Yeah, that is doing stuff in the name of atheism. And if you want to describe a policy of teaching and indoctrinating atheism while systematically attempting to suppress religion (sometimes with extreme violence) as activity not carried out, technically, “in the name of atheism” then you are splitting some extremely fine hairs.
“Oh noes,” you say, “but they also punished farmers for hoarding food, so that means that their legal sanctions can’t have been in the name of atheism!!1” Yeah, they did lots of stuff. Some of it was really evil, and some of that evil stuff was done in the name of “really strongly not believing in religion, and believing that religion was bad”… y’know, atheism.
But as I say, don’t let reality intrude. Apparently religion is the source of all evil, and any attempts to suggest otherwise are “right wing talking points.”
Would it help to point out that I’m an atheist and I’ve done some bad things in my life? No, probably wouldn’t would it.
Remember, our side is good! Categorically! The other side are bad! All of them! All of their beliefs are evil and irrational, and it makes them do bad evil stuff! (and you accuse *me* of right wing thinking, sheesh)
joeyess
@Ecks: if you’re an atheist, that’s good to know. So why coddle the believer?
Run them out of the public square, out of the public schools and back into the pulpit. that’s where they belong. that’s the only place they value and it’s the only place they deserve.
Period.
Fern
@Ecks: My grandparents left Russia around the time of the Russian revolution. They had many relatives who died – killed outright or sent to Siberia – precisely because of their religion. Not theoretical to me either.
Ecks
@joeyess: Your stupid, it hurts.
Let’s review. Mikey said:
You said:
So according to you guys, not me, you guys, religion is bad and irrational and dangerous and leads to horrible violence, while atheism and empiricism are rational and correct and do not lead to bad acts such as crusades or bombing churches.
So I point out that actually, no, atheism has been associated with stuff that’s every bit as evil as religion has been. You ask for proof, I deliver proof…
And now you’re ranting about Godwin.
So here’s the bottom line: People do evil stuff. Sometimes it is all gussied up in the name of religion, sometimes it is gussied up in the name of something else. Getting rid of religion will no more solve the problem of political violence than will getting rid of the belief in Mondays.
QE & D.
And for god sake stop hallucinating that I brought up Pascal’s wager. Either you can’t read or you don’t know what it is. Neither option speaks well of you.
Ecks
@joeyess:
Ah, now THAT, finally, is a good question.
Why coddle the believer? Well, how about because I’m married to one who a few years ago, inspired by her religious beliefs, volunteered for a religious charity which had her move thousands of miles to one of the poorest cities in the country to live for several months on very little money trying to help migrant workers who were being fucked over by the system.
Is that a good reason? I have a lot more just like it, you know.
How about the only time I’ve ever been tempted by religion in my life, which was when my friend died in high school. I sat in church at his funeral thinking how infinitely comforting it would be to believe that he wasn’t really gone, that he was just “up there” somewhere and I would see him when I died myself. I couldn’t do it, but I remember it being such a sweet and tempting solace. Who am I to deny anyone else that?
Er, how about my grandmother who was the sweetest person you would ever meet in your life, whose faith got her through the blitz in London, and lead her to spend her retirement volunteering for Meals on Wheels and other charities?
Is that enough reasons, do I have permission yet?
RJ
@Ecks:
I don’t mean that as a defence of christians or religion. It’s kinda pathetic that certain parts of the bible are `the indisputably true word of god’ while other bits are…outdated or something. The bible says to stone your child if he displeases you, in addition to any number of other ridiculous things (certain rape victims should be put to death, women shouldn’t speak in a church, shellfish is an abomination – there are more complete lists out there), and christians today happily run away from that fact.
joeyess
True enough.
however, the religion thing would eliminate half of our problems.
Look, I’m not saying “get rid of religion”. I’m saying “let go of concept of a supreme being”.
In my opinion it would make the world look a lot less fuzzy.
Plus, it would take away the sociopath’s excuse that allows them to continue their bad behavior only to claim they are “forgiven”.
RJ
@Ecks:
Your reasoning here is quite dodgy. The difference between religious and secular violence is that religious violence is committed in the name of religion. Secular violence has no similar agenda.
Atheists may well set bombs or murder people, but it isn’t in the name of atheism. Religious violence is committed all too regularly, and is accompanied by the disgusting that murder/terrorism is justified because of the criminal’s faith.
Atheism may be incorrect, but at least it is an attempt to solve life’s questions through reason.
joeyess
@Ecks: All of those things could be accomplished without the belief in a supreme being. In fact, I believe there is no such thing as an unselfish act. We act charitably precisely because if we didn’t we couldn’t look at ourselves in the mirror.
That in and of it’s self is selfish. And it’s not a bad thing.
But it’s all Ok. I’ve defended my postition that we as a species would be better off without religion. I’ve posited that notion without malice or slander.
For my trouble I get called a “douche” and “stupid”.
Thanks.
Ecks
@RJ: Certain rather loud fundamentalist Christian groups today claim that the bible is innerantly correct, and that you can’t “pick and choose” which parts you want to believe. They then proceed, as you point out, to pick and choose which parts they believe, and stretch out some really bizarre interpretations of the rest of it that they then think are the literal truth. These people are (collectively) authoritarian asshats who are doing untold harm to the country.
Most Christians don’t believe any of this. Obviously the Catholics don’t, but even baptists… Here, if you want a really insanely smart and well-informed take down of these guys and their books, read the Slacktivist’s blog. It’s written by a baptist guy who spent time at seminary school, is an active believer, really knows his stuff, and is the kind of upstanding guy that gives religion a good name. Seriously, I can’t recommend it enough.
I’m not saying “get rid of cake.” I’m saying “get rid of sugared confections that are round in shape, and fluffy in the middle with icing on the outside.”
I think if you had grown up with the certainty that there was something bigger than you could see in the world, that loved you, and sometimes made the path clear for you, then getting rid of it would actually make the world a whole lot fuzzier.
Let’s face it, science is really good at solving problems like how to make the inside of your car hot enough to be comfortable, and it’s terrible at problems like “how do I love my neighbor who has offended me.” Yeah, we atheists get by fine without religion, it’s possible, we do it. But doesn’t mean it can’t help clarify the world in sometimes some very good ways for other people. To each his own, y’know.
Sociopaths don’t need excuses. Yes, it would remove an easy rationalization, but people are creative, they’d find another one. State’s rights! Avenging the gross injustice that I totally made up! They’re funny looking and want our jerbs!
M. Bouffant
If gawd existed, it would be necessary to deny “him.”
joeyess
I grew up in a fundamentalist christian household.
An all knowing god was everywhere. Even in me.
When I let go of god, the epiphany was overwhelming and all fear of life and death were gone. In other words, the exact opposite of what you claim in your last sentence happened.
So, no, the world cleared in my case. It did not become more fuzzy.
So much for your assumptions.
RedKitten
I’m with the others who have no patience for proselytizing. And yes, it is different from recommending a movie or telling someone that cilantro tastes like soap. People usually don’t make strong moral judgments upon me, or tell me that I’m a bad person with no morals who is not raising her child properly, for not wanting to see Avatar or for liking cilantro.
If you’re excited about your religion, and want to share, then that’s fine. But I’m not interested in converting, and you refuse to respect that and then get insulting, I will not be shy in telling you to fuck yourself with a rusty chainsaw.
Ecks
There’s a great onion headline recently:
U.S. Flag Recalled After Causing 143 Million Deaths
Your argument here makes every bit as much sense.
No it’s not, atheism is just a denial of religion. You can be rational about your atheism or irrational about it, just as you can be rational about your religion (good lord, have you ever tried hanging out with Jesuits – those are some of the smartest, most worldly, and best educated people you will ever meet… and if you talk to Talmudic scholars they are relentlessly rational about the whole thing to the point of obsession), or irrational about it.
Well of course they can. But if some people are encouraged to do it by religion (and they are – religious people give to charity at higher rates than non-religious ones, and volunteer more, even when you remove “church” from the recipients of charity and volunteer work), then who are you and I to get all huffy about it. Would my wife and grandma still be good people without religion? Indubitably. Would they have done quite as much good? Probably not.
I should probably apologize for the former. There have been along line of people ahead of you making a lot of the same arguments in pretty asinine form, so you were set up to be labelled some pretty bad things when you first started pushing the case, but it was intemperate, so sorry.
On the latter, in my defense you have made some pretty blockheaded arguments (Pascal’s wager, yee). And wading in to attack something so strongly that (I’m sorry, but) you clearly don’t understand is kind of a foolhardy move. But, y’know, it’s the internets, we’ve all been on the wrong side of some big ones, we’ve all played out some losing hands here and there, we’ve all said some pretty stupid things from time to time (I know I’ve got my list)… So no hard feelings on my end, anyway. One takes ones lumps, one gets sharper over time, one lives to fight another day.
mclaren
@John Cole:
Ha!
Actually, it might be nice if humans were that important. But not even close.
Turns out the human gut is full of tame bacteria and they’re crucial to our digestion. Without our intestinal flora, humans get very sick.
By contrast, humans prove utterly unimportant to the biosphere of the planet earth. As Jonas Salk put it, “If all insects disappeared, within 50 years all life on earth would end. If all humans disappeared, all life on earth would flourish.”
It is in fact an act of supreme arrogance to equate the human species with bacteria. We’re not even remotely that important.
Ecks
@joeyess: Ahhh, that explains a lot.
Then I don’t blame you at all for thinking a lot of very lousy things about Christians in particular and religion in general. You’ve just escaped a place where it’s pretty much a blunt instrument of social control for beating people into line. Congratulations on making your escape! It’s completely understandable you have a lot of anger in you, you’ve no doubt been rather shabbily treated, and I’m sorry for calling you names. You should DEFINITELY check out Slacktivist, there’s probably some fantastic therapy for you there.
But here’s your heads-up: Not all religion is like the one you grew up with. In fact, probably most of it isn’t. Fundamentalism is the abusive crappy version.
Anyway, it’s out there to explore later if you want to… but for now, welcome to the world of freedom :)
Ecks
@mclaren: Ah, the ignominiety of being at the top of the food chain ;)
Ok, bed time! Night all!
joeyess
@Ecks: @Ecks: Thanks for the welcome. However, this has been a 30 year struggle for me. I didn’t just recently arrive in the world of freedom. I just find that the world is a much more simple place to be without religion. In contrast to that, I also find the world in which we live a complex array of beauty and fascinating wonder. I merely choose to be in awe of the cosmos over being in awe of the love of god. A god, btw, that if anyone actually takes the time to read any of these scriptures, be it Christian, Judaism, Muslim, that is a sadistic, greedy, jealous, demanding being that isn’t worthy of my worship.
I am a proud, godless, lover of human beings. Good talking with you.
j.
Mustang Bobby
@ John Cole:
Thanks for giving me a Question of the Day.
Lisa K.
As someone in the Hitchens/Dawkins camp on this matter, I will refrain from direct comment, but suffice it to say I have less use for religion than John does.
celiadexter
Thank you — my sentiments almost exactly — the only place I lose you is “I’m not even putting up a fight over the overwhelming religious influence on my government”, since that influence is responsible for too many of our policy failures (Remember Bart Stupak and how we almost lost HCR? And what about Sarah Palin’s “speech” the other day denying the separation of church and state? And 8 years of Bush?) Maybe anyone who claims his/her public policy is based on religion should be ineligible for public office — but that’s my little fantasy world…
Julie
Hell, there are times when I have no use for religion, either. As a matter of fact, according to the Gospels, Jesus himself had his moments with the religion of his day too.
This.
kreiz
Great post. I have no use for religion. Why coddle the believer? Because there’s little sense in arguing. Just as a believer trying to convert me is wasting his time, I respect him enough to likewise.
Steve LaBonne
To the whiny liberal religious types and “faitheists”:
1) People have a perfect right to believe stupid shit.
2) I have a perfect right to mock them for believing stupid shit.
Put on your big girl panties and deal.
gogol's wife
@Adam Collyer:
I’m sorry I missed both these threads, and I realize this one is dead, but thank you for your comments. You’ve said a lot of what I’ve wanted to say many times but couldn’t find the words. It’s the only thing about the commenters on this blog that bothers me. It’s as if they revel in being smug, ignorant (about what faith is, as opposed to organized right-wing religion), and insulting. And anyone here who considers him/herself an “Obot” should realize that he is a person of faith.
Annie
This is one reason I hate fundamentalists of all types — smugness…Just read on a wingnut site one comment — “Do you know why I am proud to be a conservative Christian? Because, unlike Liberals, we put our children first.”
WTF?
Immediately after the Iraq invasion, Bush and the CPA had conservative Christian educators running around the country, attempting to change primary and secondary school curricula — taking out references to Islam and putting in references to Jesus….That worked out well.
gogol's wife
@Annie:
I guess what I recognize in some of the militant atheists is the same smugness that can of course be observed in fundamentalists: “I know without a doubt how the universe is organized, and anyone who disagrees with me is evil/stupid.” That’s not what faith is about.
Steve LaBonne
You’d lose that bet. I’ve forgotten more about church history and theology than you’ll ever know. And you have the gall to accuse others of smugness?
David in NY
I’m with John. Be nice if religious folks would just keep trying to push belief and practice down my throat. I’m fine without it. Leave me alone. Shut up. Thank you.
(Posted without benefit of reading what the counter claims is 308! comments. Sheesh. And John just wanted to be left alone.)
Steve LaBonne
This is one of the stupidest of the many outrageously stupid faitheist talking points. Science exists precisely because people realized that 1) there’s a great deal we DON’T know about how the universe is organized, and 2) trying to find out more is a whole lot more productive than making up childish stories to fill our gaps in knowledge.
matoko_chan
@burnspbesq:
Well…..no.
The part of the population of Self-Declared Christians that is getting media exposure will define the public perception of All Christians.
Somehow I don’t think that is a deterrent for the followers of Tea Party Jesus.
Even from liberal- intelligent Adam on this thread I get the whole aggrieved/butthurrt “why do they hate xians schtick”.
I think I explained that.
Conservative christians interpret their faith as a mandate to tell other homo sap. what to believe.
And conservative christians are the modern face of christianity.
They are visual everyday with media coverage of the TPM.
Tea Party Jesus is defining modern christianity.
But like I said, idc. Perhaps this is the cultural evolution destiny of christianity, to schizm into 2 sects…..but only one sect of christianity will have political power…..the followers of Tea Party Jesus.
OTOH, I think god vs no-god discussions go nowhere, and the thread topic was Cole saying he has no use for religion.
Respect that, Adam.
Cole doesn’t owe you anything.
If you don’t want people to laugh at you, take off the clown shoes.
But don’t whine to the rest of us that PZ is hurrtin’ your fee fees and expect us to defend you.
The teatards SAY they are your co-religiousists, and they are gettin’ all the publicity.
They are defining christianity.
matoko_chan
@gogol’s wife:
sheesh. sooo much fail.
Like Aimai said, if getting confused with the teatards bothers you, do work son, and fix it. Not our problem.
Nothing is sacred on this blog, and we don’t have to be “polite” to you and Adam. Cole said he wants nothing to do with religion and you utterly ignore that and try to school him and fucking PROSELYTIZE him and whine about PZ and the FSM hurrtin’ your fee fees.
Do you now understand why many people percieve christians as ummmm….STUPID?
Obama has done every thing he promised me.
What has Jesus done for you lately?
gogol's wife
@Steve LaBonne:
To quote David Niven in “The Guns of Navarone”: Q.E.D.
gogol's wife
@matoko_chan:
“What has Jesus done for you lately?”
I thought you didn’t want to hear an answer to that question.
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
“Run them out of the public square”
No chance. You seem unfamiliar with, or hostile to, the First Amendment to the Constitution. Why do you feel so threatened by the mere existence of religious belief?
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
” I’ve posited that notion without malice or slander.”
Say what, now? Everything you have written in this thread has been precisely calibrated to offend. And you’ve succeeded admirably.
John Cole
Why is this still going on? Why can people not just respect what other people believe and let it drop.
I’ll say it one more time with as much clarity as possible. I have no use for religion. I understand many others do. I don’t think any less of you if you believe, and I don’t think people who don’t believe are any more enlightened. I don’t think there is anything to be gained by attacking people who deeply believe, and, in fact, I think that makes you an asshole. Some of the smartest and most decent people I know personally are believers. I’m just not.
I don’t know if that counts as smug or ignorant, but it is where I am right now. I’ve even tried in the past to find faith and God, come up empty, and decided it just isn’t for me. Sometimes I even go to church on holidays, because it makes my parents happy to be in church with all their kids. And the music is pretty and I get to see the people I grew up with. Generally, it is a pleasant experience.
It doesn’t bother me when politicians end a speech and say God Bless America. It doesn’t bother me that people swear oaths on bibles. I’m not upset by the mere existence of God or religion in the public arena. I know there are a lot of people who do believe, and I’m in the minority- besides, this is a big country, and we all need to be flexible to get along with everyone else.
Now where I have a problem, though, is when the faithful attempt to use their religious beliefs to end arguments, or to enforce their beliefs through government policy. I have a problem when religion is used to bash homosexuals and deny them their rights. I have a problem when we have to change science books to include ascientific religious nonsense. I have a problem with government licensed pharmacists deciding their religious views means they get to decide what medicine you or I use. And so on.
In short, I’m not forcing my beliefs on anyone or asking the government to enforce my beliefs, and all I would like is the same respect in return.
Lisa K.
@John Cole:
I agree. I would also submit that nothing you have posed here is actually about religious beliefs per se-it is about manipulating religious beliefs to control thought and behavior to advance a political mission, and there is where I get off the tolerance train.
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
“So, no, the world cleared in my case. It did not become more fuzzy.”
That’s great – for you. Your error lies in assuming that what works for you is the only thing that can or should work for everyone else. That’s called “intolerance,” and your intolerance is just as bad as the intolerance of the craziest wingnut fundie.
burnspbesq
@Steve LaBonne:
Wow. Talk about going all in on intolerance.
Steve LaBonne
You’re entitled to your beliefs. You have an absolute and unquestionable right- which I would defend to the death- to practice those beliefs without interference of any kind. THAT is what tolerance is. You do not have a right to have those beliefs “respected”, and verbally genuflected to, by those who find them ridiculous and/or noxious. There is no such thing as a right not to be offended. Deal.
matoko_chan
@gogol’s wife: I don’t.
It was rhetorical.
Lisa K.
@John Cole:
IMHO, I believe we need to respect the right of people to believe whatever they wish. I am under no obligation to respect the belief itself, although if it is not causing harm to anyone I am not likely to challenge it.
When it leads to mandates to teach my kids intelligent design, then I will act differently.
burnspbesq
@matoko_chan:
You obviously know that what you are characterizing as “the modern face of Christianity” is only a small and unrepresentative slice of the great diversity of Christian belief in contemporary America. I’m at a loss to understand what it is you’re trying to accomplish by persisting in this fallacy.
John Cole
@Lisa K.: That is what I meant.
matoko_chan
@gogol’s wife:
Like I said, idc.
If you don’t like being confused with the teatards, take it up with them.
As far as I’m concerned, you are all christians.
Not my problem.
Remember November
I never try to obfuscate Religion ( Big R- as in not for profit ivory tower/crystal cathedral mafias ) with religion- ( small r – those who follow a specific liturgical basis, based on codified texts )
fwiw, I’ve found this group to be the “big tent” progressive Christians:
http://www.tcpc.org/library/article.cfm?library_id=759
talking about evolution? egads, maybe Evolution was part of the plan!
matoko_chan
@burnspbesq: see above ^^.
burnspbesq
@matoko_chan:
“As far as I’m concerned, you are all christians.”
No cure for willful blindness, I guess.
Have a good day. Can’t say I’ve enjoyed our conversation, but it’s been enlightening.
matoko_chan
@burnspbesq: Let me refine that.
You have a perfect right to believe anything you wish.
I am inclined to take people at their word.
The teatards say they are christians, you say you’re a christian, okfine.
If you think they are not christians, go rumble with them…idc.
I agree with Lisa K and Cole, and I’ll go one further.
If you come to my house to proselytize…to attempt to push your sillie primitive irrational belief system on me…..then I have the perfect right to slam the door in your face, and think that you are rude and ignorant.
And to laugh at you.
lawl.
matoko_chan
This is Cole’s House, btw.
I think you are very rude.
RedKitten
Exactly. I have had a lot of Christians, during theological debates, bitch that I’m not respecting their beliefs. Sorry, but I’m not under any obligation to respect their beliefs, especially considering how little respect they show mine.
I do, however, respect their right to HAVE their beliefs. I like to hope that they’d extend me the same courtesy, but with some people, I do wonder…
Deb T
I too, have no use for religion. In fact, there’s a lot of it I absolutely detest.
I always liked Jesus though. I like the teachings associated with him. If more Christians really believed what Jesus said and forgot all that Old Testament crap, the world would be a better place.
You know “suffer the little children,” and all that good stuff.
joeyess
@burnspbesq: When I say the “pubic square” I’m referring to the ten commandments on public property, nativity scenes in front of firehouses and out of the schools. things of that nature.
Nothing more.
What I want is a church that is compliant with the 1st amendment. Theocrats want the opposite.
Unless you’re a supporter of the disgraced federal judge Roy Moore, I would think that you would agree with me on this point.
Obviously you don’t.
j.
gil mann
Most religious people realize this is an incredibly obnoxious sentiment, right? Please tell me I’m right.
demimondian
@gil mann: Yes and no.
1. It is an article of Christian faith that God does care about you, no matter what you think or don’t think of him. If that’s what you meant by “an incredibly obnoxious” sentiment, then I am honestly and genuinely sorry if that offends you; I understand your feelings, and regret them.
2. That said, to say “I don’t care whether you have any use for religion *because* religion might have a use for you” is an utterly loathsome sentiment. First, the condescending tone is repulsive — you may be right, dude[tte], but you surely have no evidence of your accuracy. Second, even if you’re right about God having a use for all of us, Which God? I’m sure that Lord Brita, Cannibal God of Al Qaeda, has a lot of use for all of us — but I’m not looking forward to that use, if you don’t mind.
I suspect you mean the second of these.
Jake
@John Cole:
But, we all respect you…That’s why we are here…And, to fight and disagree with you, too…That’s also why we are here. And, also because we don’t have lives….
slag
@r€nato:
For the record…this is a silly comparison. When concert-goers end the night exclaiming, “Man, we played a great set!” in the same way sports fans often exclaim, “We won!”, then the comparison will be apt.
As for the grand unified theory: All these things–religion, sports, television and even some movies–seem to play a ridiculously outsized role in our society. If we could just bring them all down to size and recognize them for the simple pastimes they are (on par with any other hobby, such as gardening, cooking, reading, etc), we’d be much better off.
gogol's wife
@John Cole:
“I don’t know if that counts as smug or ignorant.” If that is a reference to my comment, I should clarify that I was speaking of some commenters on the blog, not the blog posts themselves. I have no argument with the original post here. It is not offensive, smug, or ignorant. But since this is an open thread, I thought it was appropriate to respond to some of the comments rather than the original post. Mainly I wanted to thank Adam Collyer for his comments.
gil mann
This is kinda awkward, but no, I meant the first.
demimondian
@gil mann: Well, in that case, I’m sorry to offend, but that’s not something I’m going to give up.
What I can do is not point out that I believe it. Is that a reasonable compromise?
Ecks
@gil mann:
Most religious people realize this is an incredibly obnoxious sentiment, right? Please tell me I’m right.
As an atheist who’s struggled with this for a while, here’s the translation that works best for me: When they say “God,” in these types of statements, read “the universe collectively.”
It turns these statements from possessive grabs (“my God, he’ll claim you anyway”) to kind of sweet sentiments (“it is my hope that in the universe generally you will turn out to be somehow important and valued”). And having talked to quite a few non-fundy Christians, they seem to find this a generally accurate translation so it’s not even like you are willfully misunderstanding them. And if they chose to personify this general loving goodwill universality as a specific dead person then what the hey, no skin off my nose, good for them.
So why not acknowledge that while we surely have the legal right to disagree, the world is also a better and nicer place if we voluntarily extend a smidge of understanding.
Until they come around dictating what we do with our bodies and demanding compliance, and at that point the civility has been ended unilaterally, by them.
demimondian
@Ecks: While it’s a kind thought, you need to recognize that even us “non-fundy” types really mean “My Good will get you anyway if he wants you.” That’s kind of what omnipotence is all about, don’t you know?
As far as that goes, though, it seems worse than pointless to say so. “Yeah, you actively don’t believe, but that doesn’t matter, ’cause He’s a-gonna MAKE YOU, BOY!” Umm, yeah. Ri-ight. Let’s go back to talking about the Cannibal God of Al Qaeda (who has nothing to do with the God of Islam, for those of you who wonder), shall we?
matoko_chan
@gogol’s wife:
oh….I guess that was meant for me?
Look…..I don’t care what anyone believes.
You say you are christians, the teatards say they are christians, so?
As far as I know, christians profess belief in christ.
You are the same to me, just like “faith” is EXACTLY the same thing as organized right wing religion.
There is no perceptible difference……so that is enui, not ignorance.
And I’m smug and insulting….because I don’t really see a nano-wafer of sincere difference between you, and that is freakin’ obviouso.
I don’t want you to tell me there are differences……tell them.
I don’t care, you can all believe w/e you want.
Where this becomes a bad thing for me….is that I really like discussing things like Crick’s Astonishing Hypothesis and the technological singularity and Evolutionary Theory of Games and cognitive anthropology, and there are people here that have the substrate to do that.
But the “christians” here are the skunks in the barn in all these discussions because all they want to do is measure e-peens and bitch about bein’ disrespected instead of contributing to intellectual theorycrafting.
boooorrrrrrriiiiinnnnngggg
Squeaky Smith
When I was young, elememtary school, some folks in town started a Unitarian fellowship, including members of my family. The trinitarians (father son and holy ghost for Baptist types, holy virgin for RCs) were horrified to discover that there was a religion in America that didn’t explicitly worship the trinity. [How this got called monotheism still confuses me.]
Anyway, a local radio preacher started preaching about godless Unitarians, and by name too, my name! I had a hard time understanding why I instantly became friendless in 5-12th grade.
I got over it after a decade or so…
demimondian
@Squeaky Smith: I’ve been to a UU fellowship where they processed the cross. I couldn’t quite understand that…
Flanagan
Amen, brother! Very well said!
ZaftigAmazon
This reminds of an interchange back in college:
A student/fundamentalist had been proselytizing to one of the professors. The professor replied that he was an athiest. The student/fundamentalist answered, “How can you stop from killing and raping and stealing?”
Later, one of the professor’s friends lamented that he hadn’t witnessed the interchange. “I would have told him, “I can’t stop.”
plaindave
One thing missing from this entire discussion is the concept of reward/punishment inherent in Christianity.
Christians often think their religion makes them good (or better than non-believers). I’m not buying it.
Assume you hold a loaded gun to the head of a bad person. Do you consider that person to be good simply because they’ve stopped committing bad acts to avoid the bullet that awaits them should they continue? No, you do not. You know they are still bad.
Do I consider the good things (if any) done by Christians to be other than coerced? Of course not. They’re just trying to avoid eternity in Hell. Given the belief, their good behavior is not to be admired.
When non-believers do good things, they are simply being good. Quite admirable, I’d say.
gil mann
Yeah, that’d be great. Let’s shake on–
Never mind, then.
Mirror
You say you believe in an invisible sky man, but don’t want me to call it an invisible sky man…
How come you aren’t out in the news attacking pedophile protecting bishops who are dictating to congressman on national policy? Don’t they too say they are doing the will of the invisible sky man?
demimondian
@gil mann: Hard luck, then, dude.
In this case, you’re the one with the problem here. Tolerating my beliefs doesn’t mean tolerating my actions. It *does* however, mean tolerating the beliefs. I don’t say anything about “my God’s gonna get you anyway” because it’s impolite and borderline intolerable. That doesn’t mean I don’t think it, or believe it, merely that I’ll be polite to you, just as I would to any other nut-case religionist who wanted to control my thoughts.
matoko_chan
@demimondian: well…it does mean that you won’t get invited to many discussions of tardigrades and SBH.
You are already pithed by the Big White Sky Father.
:)
Cyrus
@Adam Collyer:
Most liberals aren’t truthers (unless you’re using an unreasonable, unusual definition of either term). Most Muslims aren’t terrorists. Most American Christians are Creationists, though. (According to this, people who go to church “weekly” or “almost weekly” are 30 points more likely to believe that “God created human beings in their present form”.) Most American Christians are also right-wing. (According to this, people who said that religion was important in their daily lives were 10 points more likely to support Obama than McCain, and among those, white Protestants were 36 points more likely.)
Most Christians are right-wing nuts. Not all, of course, I’ve never said so and anyone who would is wrong, but in casual speech it’s unreasonable to demand scrupulous adherence to percentages and caveats for every possible exception. If it bothers you that I would make such a statement, your quarrel is with the nutty right-wing majority, not with me.
Josh Pizzo
Man, there’s nothing I like better than to hear the whine of Christians who think they’re somehow prosecuted or treated poorly…boo hoo, Adam! Geez, you think that 99.999% of elected officials in this country were something other than Christian.
As for being thought of as “idiotic,” psst: People do not come back to life once they’re dead. One would have thought this obvious, but…
rick mc
Amen to that!
First, Do No Violence! We need a Hippocratic Oath for All Religions. A promise of no violence for religious beliefs or purposes, including; bombings, shootings, pedophilia and other sex abuse, proprietary rights over females, intimidation and other violence to the soul. After all, if God needed violence done for His/Her purposes, He could surely take care of it Him/Herself.
The most recent revelations of rampant – think of that, undeniably rampant – sex abuse of children within the Catholic Church, and cover-ups that appear to be traceable all the way up to the current Pope, should be enough to outrage any human being.
And that is truly the tip of the iceberg.
Last year, hundreds of ultra-Orthodox Jews rioted in the streets of Jerusalem, throwing stones and scuffling with police. The violence-worthy issue? The matter of parking and driving on Saturdays.
Around the world, violence has erupted between different Islamic factions. And between Islamic extremists and ‘infidels.’ Christian factions have bombed each other, and Christian extremists have shot abortion doctors. Fear and intimidation are hallmarks of religious extremism in every part of the world.
Violence for religion is terrorism for an interpretation.
We need to steer the world away from the insanity that different interpretations of religious texts, different beliefs, are to die or kill for.
Within each religion, we need that vast majority of members to insist on discussing, and denouncing, religious violence within their own faith.
Humanity should be better than this by now. In today’s world of technology and communications, we should be able to end this particular insanity.
As with other motivations for like actions, intimidation and violence in the name of God is always abhorrent, unjustified, and illegal. The perpetrators are criminals, to be exposed, denounced, and prosecuted at every opportunity.
PriorityStrategic
@Beej: Great line. Great book.
Simon
@Adam Collyer: Hi, Adam. You seem like a thoughtful person. But saying “invisible sky man” reflects MY belief, that religion is made up and that there is no supreme deity. So we could go back and forth about this all day long, with you saying my stated beliefs are offensive to your stated beliefs, and me stating my belief that your stated beliefs are ridiculous, and that you’re attempting to limit my expression of THAT belief out of deference for your own. But the issue is this: Don’t we AGREE about right-wing nuts? Can’t we both thoughtfully get our heads together to defeat them?
P.S. I have faith too. It just isn’t religion. Can we agree that we both have faith, but that what we have faith in is different?
CWD
@joeyess:
I’ve read more than a few biographies of Stalin and Mao and I’ve run into this in more than one bio: Stalin and Mao were both divinity students in thier respective youths. They may have claimed that thier regimes were athiest, but they certainly used religiously inspired ideas, structures and myths to help control the states they attempted to murder.
1. dogma = party line
2. inqusition = Checkists, Cadre
3. prophets = Marx and Lennin as predecessors – Mao and Stalin as living prophets of the revolution
4. martyrs/saints = Pavlik Morozov, Zhao Yiman – really too many to count
5. priests = high party members
6. an adversary = capitalism
etc. ad naseum.
From what I have read they used the control systems developed by organized religion – they just edited the roles, titles and attributes of the system elements.
CWD
FWIW I agree with matoko_chan.
The xtian right will severly weaken “christianity” in this country. They will drive away the young and open minded with the constant barrage of hateful messages and profound lunacy.
I regard this as a good thing.
demimondian
@matoko_chan: Quite possibly so. Then again, my wife did some of the fundamental work on the genes involved in drosophilid head formation, both in melanogaster and in other species in the genus. If I want to get answers to questions about evolutionary genetics, I can go home and talk to her.
Under the circumstances, you’ll have to forgive me for not feeling a terrible loss in not being welcome at your soirees.
William
As a life-long atheist (previously flaming, now peaceable), I’m a little dumbfounded by the religious response here that basically runs, “It makes me sad when you generalize about Christians.”
Seriously? Because that sounds like a heap of bullshit to me. Most Christians seem happy to take all of the benefits that come with their majority status and cultural dominance, but suddenly when you hold them responsible for their co-religionists, that’s those other guys. Heads you win, tails I lose. Great.
You want me to have a lot of respect for your beliefs? Start by respecting them yourselves, and stop letting jackasses drag your god’s name through the mud. As long as you’re resting easy while people are being harmed in the name of what you purport to believe, you’re darned tooting I’m going to be painting you when I get out my broad brush.
Svensker
@Steve LaBonne:
Charmed to meet ya, I’m sure.
News Nag
To Adam Collyer:
What’s the matter, Adam? Is your Invisible Sky God’s ego so delicate She can’t be accurately described? Certain of Her followers’ egos certainly seem to be. O ye of hilarious faith!
Svensker
@John Cole:
Me, too, and I’m a Christian. I don’t think you’ll get any argument about those things from any of your regular posters, religious, agnostic or atheist.
Someone wrote about this a while ago — not on this blog, don’t remember where — and it made a lot of sense to me: the US is changing from a mostly white mostly Christian nation to a mixed race not so Christian nation. This is threatening to people whose whole identity is wrapped up in being part of a mythical old-fashioned All American white Christian nation. They are freaked out because what they knew and valued seems to be disappearing. Like many people who are freaked out, they are doubling down and trying to hold on to something that is slipping away. It is a losing battle they are fighting and it’s a shame they can’t see that and just gracefully accept being a small (and maybe vibrant) part of a mosaic. But they’re too busy being scared and fighting to do that. Too bad a bunch of other folks have to get irritated, inconvenienced or hurt in the process.
I think the rise of fundamentalism all over — Jewish, Islamic and Christian — has to do with fear of the great change that is coming upon the world. Clinging to god and guns is comforting (where have I heard that before…?).
But, as to why this thread is going so long — religion/philosophy is a very interesting topic. How did the universe get here, where does life come from, are we more than the chemical sum of our parts, is there meaning in life and if so where does it derive from, is there such a thing as truth, how do you define morality and should you, how best should we live our lives. These are pretty interesting questions, whether or not you believe in God. Aren’t they?
Winston Smith
@William:
Exactly how does that work? Can we repeal their 1st Amendment rights to free expression? Perhaps you think that the recommended nasty letter campaign will change their tiny little minds. The religious left criticizes the religious right — loudly — all the time, but people who are out of that loop blithely assume that this must not be happening because the expected result (the religious right is ashamed and stops being stupid) isn’t happening.
Newsflash: it’s really hard to embarrass morons. Try it at a Tea Party rally and get back to me.
Does anyone here really believe that centuries of homophobia, racism and other bigotry can be ended by a campaign of sternly-worded missives from fellow Christians? Boy howdy, living in your playpen must be fun.
Winston Smith
@News Nag:
Grow up.
This “sky fairy” bullshit is just an attempt to be deliberately insulting — like calling homosexuality a “lifestyle choice.” It’s technically accurate in some sense, but formulated to denigrate people.
Is your ego so damaged that you have to be a bully?
gil mann
@demimondian:
Well, you certainly can’t be accused of intellectual rigidity.
BrighidG
I’m more annoyed you keep conflating religion with Christianity. Why do so many atheists buy into a right-wing meme like that?
Christianity is a religion but it is not all religion period.
matoko_chan
@Cyrus:
that’s what she said.
;)
matoko_chan
@demimondian: lawl.
Tell me your wife discusses Crick’s astonishing hypothesis after church and I’ll be impressed.
btw….didn’t work on drosophilia genome pre-date the discovery of electricity?
hawhaw haw jus’ kiddin’.
:)
I relly think that is pretty disingenuous, demon…. anecdotal data about your wife’s genetics chops is like the Texas school board citing the Discovery Institute on ToE for textbook choice.
matoko_chan
@Winston Smith:
Mebbe you should secede.
hahahahaha!
burnspbesq
@joeyess:
That’s a useful clarification (if it’s a clarification and not a walk-back), because I read your original statement as saying that people of faith should be prohibited from taking positions on issues of public concern that are informed by their beliefs. That’s wrong on more levels than I can count.
And in response to your question, I don’t have any problems with the current state of the case law with respect to public display of religious iconography.
Adam Collyer
I admit to being surprised that this thread is still so active, given the latest front page stuff going on. I almost feel the need to apologize for its lifespan and for probably really irritating John.
@Simon:
Of course we all agree about right-wing nuts, and I believe I’ve said as much here, though I’m sorry if I haven’t made it as clear as it was intended. And people can have faith that isn’t religion, and certainly I agree that people can have differing faiths all their own. I don’t expect to be infringing on your beliefs, and you are very much allowed to feel about me and my religion as you wish. But what I expect people, particularly progressives who pride themselves on tolerance, to understand is that a little civility goes a long way, and that there are plenty of religious progressives who don’t need to be called idiots or talked down to because of their faith. Much like I don’t call atheists idiots because of their beliefs. The knee jerk reaction to any conversation involving religion doesn’t have to require people to make condescending and mean-spirited comments about each other. When religion is specifically invoked to question another’s judgment, then that person’s faith is fair game. But I certainly haven’t done that in this thread, nor in my personal life – I haven’t proselytized, tried to convert, or tried to push my faith on policy. I even responded to the policy argument above to Kay somewhere back deep in the comments.
I appreciate being called thoughtful, so thank you. And I thank gogol’s wife for the kind words, though I’m not sure they were necessarily earned.
I am, however, interested in the responses of people who say that I do not wish to be called a moron because of my faith, then I should be challenging the people who are using my faith in an attempt to attack others. That’s fine, but I’m curious as to your plan for me to go about that. Since literally none of you know me outside of this blog (or probably outside this thread, for that matter), you don’t really know how I deal with the problem itself. It shouldn’t surprise you, based on my comments about right-wing religious zealots here, that I do counter others verbally and in writing when the discussion turns to those subjects. I certainly don’t fear confrontation from these people; in fact, I embrace it. I do question, though, what else a normal person can do? I’m not famous, nor a politician. If you have any suggestions as to how a 26 year old law student can get himself on TV or in the news as a defender of his faith from its’ hijackers, I’d certainly be interested. Otherwise, I’m not sure what else I can do besides speak up when I see the issue in the light of day and act in accordance with my own values and set good examples for the people that I know.
kay
@Adam Collyer:
I’m still not religious, Adam ( joke! just a joke, I know you’re not bent on converting) but you’re going to be a good lawyer.
Good job. Well argued. Persistence counts :)
matoko_chan
@Adam Collyer:
Dude, do what Luther did. Secede.
okfine, you started this throwdown.
Let’s battle.
idc what you believe. idc what the teatards believe.
you are both irrational supernaturalists as far as I can see.
You are whining that liberals and progressives are hurrtin’ your fee fees……grow up.
I defend your right to believe any damn thing you want, but i don’t owe your belief system itself a nanoparticle of respect.
I think you should keep it to yourself, and not be butthurt because no one wants to share with you.
Sharing is for church not for the public square.
Keep it in your pants.
No one wants to see it.
William
@Winston Smith:
Pics or it didn’t happen.
You claim that it goes on all the time, but I’m not seeing any of it. Where are the religious protest groups calling out all of the nominally Christian politicians whenever they hide behind God? When do sincere Christians go and picket churches who aren’t living up to what Jesus was on about? Which prominent preachers are calling out the hateful televangelists, the Texan school-warpers, the fundie home-schoolers, and the all-in-god’s-name bigots?
What I do see is the occasional quiet statement from a reasonable Christian. But from this atheist’s perspective, the dominant Christian discourse in the US is mostly right wing, stubbornly ignorant of modern science, and not, by my lights, particularly moral.
If you are calling yourself a Christian and aren’t actively and publicly fighting that, then in my view you’re accepting it and participating in the in-group benefits of it. In which case, I refuse to accept the, “oh, it’s those *other* Christians” dodge.
Just to be clear, it’s not only Christians that I feel this way about. Rich people who don’t do anything for the poor, men who do nothing to promote gender equality, and white people who think ending racism is somebody else’s responsibility: all suspect. If they’re not part of the solution, then they are part of the problem, and benefiting from it all the while.
Winston Smith
@William:
Where are you looking?
Did you notice Bishop Gene Robinson? He’d really just like to be the Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire, but instead, he’s the “gay” Bishop and he spends most of his time as an activist fighting religious homophobia.
Also, you are missing a major something pretty huge. No, Bishop Robinson doesn’t go around picketing fundie churches — he did something much more effective: he became a gay Bishop. This, and the elevation of a woman to presiding Bishop has literally torn the Episcopal church apart. You really have no idea what a big deal this schism is. A lot of people have been hurt and the conflict is no fun, but those of us who are enduring consider the principle too important to back off.
It’s abundantly clear that the most popular method for responding to behavior that people don’t like is to try to control that behavior. You’d think that would be a tactic in sole use by the authoritarian right, but the left (as seen here) seems quite happy with it. Sometimes the best protest is just to do the right thing and do it publicly.
Believe me, Bishop Robinson is a huge middle finger to the religious right.
Seriously, dude, where the hell have you been?
Winston Smith
@matoko_chan:
I, for one, am glad that everyone in the world finally has a spokesperson. I don’t know how everyone on the planet managed to even hold an opinion before you came along, matoko_chan.
Thanks for being the voice of everybody.
matoko_chan
@Winston Smith: we went over this….a LOT of people hate christians.
Academics, jews, youth, musicians, artists, etc.
You get all butthurt about why this would be would so.
People don’t want to be told what to do.
Keep it in your pants.
BrighidG
@matoko_chan: @matoko_chan: Anyone who actually hates an entire group probably has issues.
Also, it would be easier if you just said you hate Christians and stop trying to drag other people into it as if it props up your argument.
matoko_chan
I didn’t say i hated christians.
i said a lot of people do.
Do you deny that?
what i said is that idc what Adam believes….and that to me his beliefs are basically no different from teatard christians.
they are all irrational superstionists.
also, too……i don’t owe his belief system any particular respect.
If he wants to believe the same stupid shit the teatards do, its okfine with me.
And those beliefs belong in the church or in the family, not in the public square.
Like I keep saying, keep it in your pants and we will get along fine.