What do you have a bigger problem with...
Posted on: March 28, 2008 - 1:38pm
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What do you have a bigger problem with...
What do you have a bigger problem with, religion in general or Christians specifically.
Personally i have the biggest beef with Christians, mostly because of the constant contradictions, inability to keep to their religion, and the inability to tolerate anything....
Religions as a whole is annoying but Christians seem to be the worst at their cause...
Also, i believe that Buddist, who fully follow Buddhas teachings most tolerable, because Buddism has no gods.
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Power leads to corruption
Corrution leads to crime
Crime doesn't pay
So if you study you'll go broke.
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My point of view:
Lets not discriminate religions, lets hate them all without exceptions.
To me Islam is the most alarming religion. Christianity is second on that list.
I'd say Christians - since living in the US that's what the overwhelming ammount of people are. Christians are almost the total here of people trying to force their values on everyone else.
Matt Shizzle has been banned from the Rational Response Squad website. This event shall provide an atmosphere more conducive to social growth. - Majority of the mod team
I would say its all about the context of where you are living. If you were brought up Muslim, brainwashed, and then became an atheist in the midst of a majority of Muslims I am sure you would probably dislike Muslims more. I was brought up Christian, know more about Christianity, and can see the hypocrisy, fallacy, and ridiculousness of it much easier than religions I am not as familiar with. Christians are the ones constantly forcing their social and political worldviews upon me at the present time. That being said, Judaism begat Christianity and Islam ripped off both of those, so while I can say we should think they are all equally irrational, some affect us more than others. While I think Christianity personally affects me the most, I would say Islam in most theocratic states in its present form is what I have the biggest problem with.
“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” Yoda
"Faith is a Virtue" is the worst idea anyone ever invented. Period. That is what makes all religions work. Without that idea, no Islam, no Christianity. If people were going to commit atrocities, they'd at least have to come up with a plausibly empirical justification for it.
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
http://hambydammit.wordpress.com/
Books about atheism
I agree with Watcher and HeyZeus, that Islam is the biggest threat. Mostly because there are still countries that a pretty much Theocracies run by Islam. Christianity in America is trying its hardest, and succeeding in some minor cases, to convert America to a Theocracy... but have yet to succeed to the point where everything we do is based off of the bible.
I do agree with you through, WBFL, about Buddhism being the most tolerable. I may only think that though because I havent really looked in to it. There is a certain quote that I feel justifies my tolerance of Buddhism until I find anything else that would make me think otherwise:
"Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anyhting merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find anything that agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it." - Siddhartha Guatama (The Buddha)
I don't have a problem with Christianity or religion in general per se. Being irrational - which is what faith really is - is the problem. And it makes more than religions a problem. Stalinist communism is a perfect example of the dogmatic non-thinking that gets us into real trouble.
More than being against anything, I am all for teaching critical thinking and eradicating this silly notion that faith is a facet of a good person.
"Anyone can repress a woman, but you need 'dictated' scriptures to feel you're really right in repressing her. In the same way, homophobes thrive everywhere. But you must feel you've got scripture on your side to come up with the tedious 'Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve' style arguments instead of just recognising that some people are different." - Douglas Murray
Don't mean to go off topic here, but what does this mean when you say it? I'm used to seeing it in online games and other forums as "Quit Fucking Talking", but in your response to Hamby, it doesnt seem like thats what you mean.
I would never hate someone just for being Christian. I mean some of my best friends are... *tugs at collar nervously*
Seriously though, I find myself not so much having a beef with Christians so much as I have an issue with any supernatural religious belief. Religions collect the morals of the time at which they were written and then wrap them up in supernatural bullshit to the point that you almost lose sight of any moral message (its like taking a nice steak and then wrapping it in raw sewage). This doesn't mean that I agree with the morals found in religion (keeping with the steak metaphor a 2000 year old steak is going to be pretty rotten by the time I find it).
I think you can find some things that we as a people have generally kept up with in many old religions, like bits about being nice to people, trying to help out your fellows, etc. However, with that nice supernatural container, people declare, not that these were the morals of the zeitgeist at the time of writing, but were handed down straight from GAWD(tm) and if the big G said be nice to people and we still feel that way, the we should also kill gays, not do anything on Sunday, keep from saying certain words, and make sure women know their place in the relationship.
Heck I have problems with Buddhism and the whole reincarnation thing. Sure their take on it still leaves one with having to get all their living in now because the next life won't be you, but I just take issue with supernaturalism outside of my movies, fiction books, and D&D games.
The Regular Expressions of Humanistic Jones: Where one software Engineer will show the world that God is nothing more than an undefined pointer.
Q.F.T. in the more polite sections of the web is Quoted for Truth.
The Regular Expressions of Humanistic Jones: Where one software Engineer will show the world that God is nothing more than an undefined pointer.
I'm an Athiest because everything I've herd read or experienced from any god cult tells me it's a fairy tale waste of time. The shear illogic of any dogma, all based on the impossible existence of a supreme being who loves me as long as I don't piss him off. I do not hate religion, it is far to easy to laugh at and I need a god laugh now and then. Christians piss me off the most because they spend too much time trying to get others to think the way they think, rarely do they even understand their own religions yet they want me to drop to my knees and blindy believe what they believe, no thinking required!!!!!!!!!!!!
"Very funny Scotty; now beam down our clothes."
VEGETARIAN: Ancient Hindu word for "lousy hunter"
If man was formed from dirt, why is there still dirt?
"Anyone can repress a woman, but you need 'dictated' scriptures to feel you're really right in repressing her. In the same way, homophobes thrive everywhere. But you must feel you've got scripture on your side to come up with the tedious 'Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve' style arguments instead of just recognising that some people are different." - Douglas Murray
I'd have to say fundamentalist/evangelical Christians... Simply because they represent the biggest threat to my way of life. The attacks on science and education. The attempts at instituting theocracy. The teaching of hate and discrimination. The outright lies and deceptive practices.... we all see it every day. It's almost like they want to stop progress in it's tracks and drag us kicking and screaming back into the nineteenth century.
Islam is pretty screwed up, maybe even more so than any other religion... but radical Muslims are not on my doorstep, running for the local school board or trying to change our Constitution.
Scientology ranks right up there as well... I'm sure you all are well versed in their craziness. In addition to having an extremely nutty belief system (I guess it's no more nutty than any other cult, but thats no compliment), they are also very abusive to anyone who speaks out against them.
"If Atheism is a religion, then health is a disease!"
Heh... I'm not as video game savvy as some, and I wasn't familiar with it either. Judging from context, my best guess was "Quite fucking true."
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
http://hambydammit.wordpress.com/
Books about atheism
If someone or some group professes to believe;
That Invisible, non-corporeal beings exist.
That These beings interact with and in fact direct the material world.
That muttering to your walls/floor/ceiling etc. can pursuade these beings to violate the laws of physics for the benifit of the mutterer.
That one or more of these beings is actually responsible for the existence of the entirity of the universe, and at the same time has an inordinate interest in what members of one species on one planet do with their genitalia.
That 'faith' ie, belief without evidence is somehow the highest of virtues instead of a mental defect...
Then I'm agin' it.
LC >;-}>
Christianity: A disgusting middle eastern blood cult, based in human sacrifice, with sacraments of cannibalism and vampirism, whose highest icon is of a near naked man hanging in torment from a device of torture.
Yeah it's religion, christians can be annoying, but then again so can any group (get a bunch of scots, irish and english, in the same room and you'll know what I mean), but religious beliefs and dogmatic faith that requires the suspension of common sense, logic and reason, I am completely against. Even more so religions that advocate violence as a solution (christian, muslims, jews, hindus and various other religious views). Violence to me should be an absolute last resort (in the case of saving your own life or someone else's life from a violent person), but never as a solution to dealing with others of different opinions, ideologies, or beliefs.
Personally christianity irks me more, simply becasue I was one. If you've read anything I've written you'll know I'm not too stoked with that.
I think islam does represent the more serious threat to mankind, but out of sight out of mind right?
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Argument from Sadism: Theist presents argument in a wall of text with no punctuation and wrong spelling. Atheist cannot read and is forced to concede.
I find all religions equally alarming because they place the majority of their emphasis on how to reach the afterlife. And the things they claim a person needs to do to reach the afterlife have very little to do with resolving critical problems we face here on earth. And for those of us who are quite sure there is no afterlife, that's a little frightening. I was absolutely floored a couple of weeks ago when both the Catholic and the Baptist churches actually declared polluting a sinful behavior. I'm not optimistic that it's going to much in the near term, but it's a step in the right direction. I don't care if someone believes in God. What makes me angry is when they use that belief to take actions (or inaction) that are contrary to common sense.
Nobody I know was brainwashed into being an atheist.
Why Believe?