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The Rational Response Squad is a group of atheist activists who impact society by changing the way we view god belief. This site is a haven for those who are pushing back against the norm, and a place for believers of gods to have their beliefs exposed as false should they want to try their hand at confronting us.
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Hahaha that is fckn hilarious.
I actually got on a prayer website last week just for the hell of it.. ya know why not.. i figure the more people praying that I get a flatter tummy for gay pride halloween block party and a new BMW the better right?
Well I still dont have a beamer and I have actually gained 2 pounds.
As far as I am concerned that is enough proof for me haha.
How does prayer work? How do theists separate praying from any other action? Isnt it their belief that their magic entity is aware of everything they do? Theists, it would appear, also believe that not only is god a magical being but also they themselves have magical abilities also. They seem to have the delusion that praying is somehow transmitted with a magic characteristic signal as if it had a different frequency so that god recognizes it as being a prayer or that it is communicated via a special channel like the red phone in the oval office.
Perhaps they imagine that when they put their hands together and close their eyes an electrical circuit of some kind is turned on like a switch. It also seems that some theists believe they can increase the urgency of their prayer by increasing the force between their hands and squinting their eyes more forcefully which strangely enough makes them appear to be in pain.
This is in fact what I was taught in Sunday school. The more important the subject of the prayer was the ‘harder’ you pray. To pray really really ‘hard’ you had to scrunch up your face as if you just hit your thumb with a hammer. Even as a child I considered this to be very bizarre. If you are an observant individual you might have noticed that the real energy of prayer is emotional intensity. I’ve argued often that the belief in which theists call god is really a feeling, an emotion. I have yet to pin down exactly which emotion but I think it is a mixed emotion.
How many times have you heard ‘god’ described as a feeling? “I can feel His presence”? I asked one close theist acquaintance what she felt if there was no god. She confessed that it was pure fear. I asked her, “Fear of what?” She did not know, it was just an intense fear. I concluded that her belief in a god lessened this fear to a tolerable level. From this I’ve surmised that the more religious an individual is the stronger the underlying fears they have.
I've also concluded that what is feared is death.
People who think there is something they refer to as god don't ask enough questions.
From reality
It remains to be seen what the world will be like if everyone was an atheist with the knowledge we have now because it seems there has always been irrational beliefs about what some supposed god demanded of us.
People who think there is something they refer to as god don't ask enough questions.
Humans are the only animal that I know of that is capable of willful self deception. Now since humans are in a position to eliminate most, if not all, life on the planet with a declaration of nuclear or biological war, there is little allowance for self deception.
People who think there is something they refer to as god don't ask enough questions.
I am 15 years old currently attending high school in the Southeast U.S. I recently became an agnostic about 6 months back, still struggling a bit, but anyways, there is this girl around my age dying of cancer and everyone in the local county has been rallying people and students up to pray for her. I do not believe in prayer but i did decide to attend a prayer gathering in our auditorium today just to help support her. I did not mind blending in with the crowd and pretending to pray, or even listening to a methodist preacher talk some inspiration. He explained that even if the girl died it was a win-win situation, the girl would go to heaven. But then, just as I was predicting, the preacher started telling everyone about how we all deserve to die and be punished, and that it was just plain silly not to accept Jesus and repent. He continued to preach this like it was pure 100% fact and the school staff members joined in as well. This was supposed to be a rally to support the girl with cancer, yet they had to use this opportunity to take advantage of people when they were at their weakest moment. The preacher stated that we are not accidents and yet provided nothing but scripture to support that claim. Where I live there is nothing but right-wing fundamentalist Christians, and the school staff knew that they could get by with this. They honestly believe that they are doing a wonderful thing for everyone, but they never question what they do. I could barely eat my lunch, I was so disgusted. I realize that I kind of went off topic with this, but i just had to tell someone my views on this, who won't tell me to get back in church. This makes me not want to go back to school, and I feel like an idiot for even attending that event, I just wanted to support the poor girl. But my gut told me this was going to happen.
oh wow. i'm sorry about that lizard. Don't feel like you can't go back to school though. I know high school sucks big ones, but stay in school, use your mind to form your own opinions about religion, and just continue to get on websites like this one, and never stop reading non-fiction, and then maybe next time the adults around you try to force their beliefs down everyone's throat, YOUR MIND WILL BE READY AND YOU CAN SPEAK UP AND EDUCATE THEM WITH TRUE FACTS ABOUT THEIR RELIGION, AND LET THEM KNOW YOU ARE NOT JUST ANOTHER FOLLOWER!
Welcome to the forum, Lizard1380.
I'm so sorry to hear that. Yeah, it makes my blood boil too, but for now, unfortunately, that's the way it is.
You should definitely go back to school. In fact, you should acquire excellent grades, so that after you graduate, you can attend a good university, somewhere far away from there. I trust that you're far more intelligent than most of your peers; you can do it.
I would advise that you NOT attempt the above. In general, I think you shouldn't be too confrontational with these kinds of issuses, and I think that most of the people on this forum would agree with me. Engaging in genuinely open-minded discussion is good, but going around picking fights won't benefit you or the people you're arguing with or the girl with cancer.
I hope I don't sound too preachy.
This might interest you:
http://www.rationalresponders.com/rrs_authors
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
Thanks for your advice. I am still going to school and so far have not missed a day since it started, which is a major improvement for me. My friends all claim to be born again christians, and only a few times have I ever been forced to speak my views. But facts equal no value to them, they just speak like they wrote everything in the science book. But they really are not that bad about staying on my back about religion, they do almost everything the typical teenager would, that is smoking pot, stealing, and using almighty god's name in vain whom they so badly fear. I have rarely ever stolen anything, never smoked pot or cigarettes, and seldomly use all knowing god's name in vain! It's all good and a bag of potato chips though, jesus will take care of them. And I also found it amusing when our vice principal started jaw bonning about following god's will when just a few years back, she was caught cheating on her husband with our principal during the summer break. Her husband(now ex husband) hired a private investigator and that is how they were exposed. But with a trip to the lawyers office, it was all good and they kept their jobs. No need to go on, I know there are well devout religious followers out there, but it's just halarious what some people do