Does the threat of eternal immolation from theists constitute bullying?
Offline As atheists we are told that when we die having rejected jesus and his loving heavenly father, we will descend to hell, where we will be burned and the smoke of our torment will never cease. Along with this, our twitchings and screamings will form an agreeable spectacle for the lamb and an unspecified number of angels, none of which, apparently, will have anything better to do.
My point is this. In the forums, there are those times when in the course of general argument, theists will threaten us will hell and I want to know whether people think this constitutes bullying. There are those who will think: "Well - there's no god, there's no hell, so who cares what they threaten us with?" And this is true. But there are also people here raised in the delights of the church, for whom these unpleasant threats are particularly odious.
So when our christian brothers and sisters stop talking rationally and start yelling about hell do they actually press the bully button?
In considering this question, let's reverse the concept. What if an atheist started threatening a theist on the site and saying they were born evil, immoral, deserved die, deserved to be burned? Where going to pay? What would we think then?
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
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I'm not certain that even constitutes a threat in the sense of a declaration of an intent to inflict harm, much less bullying. The person is saying they think something bad will happen to you that they have no control over whatsoever. Don't get me wrong. I think it's completely moronic. I'm just not sure if it's actually a threat.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
I think the theists that visit here pretty much know their religion is BS. They're really just trolling when they bring up all this external torture in hell crap.
The threats of hell really only work on children and adults with diminished mental capacities. What really bothers me is how theists can justify this abuse and bullying then claim some kind of 'moral' high ground over us.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
Yes, it is bullying.
It's just totally impotent bullying.
And the other half is Handgrenades.
I consider the promise of Helfire to be abut as close to bullying or threatenning as the 5 year old threatenning to Drop a Nuke on my house.
And about as Mature.
When you say it like that you make it sound so Sinister...
But anytime a theist in the course of an argument says something like: "Fine - well - when you're standing in front of god on judgment day you'll quickly change your tune", etc, there feels to me an implicit threat.
It is ridiculous I know but because christians believe it I can't help thinking it's more reprehensible a characteristic in them than we think. They are not joking around. They don't just say it, they are good with it.
I, and I know lots of other folk here, in part reject god because of his weird threats of punishment for not loving him. Many christians, however, seem quite comfortable with worshipping, nay, loving, what to a rational person
would be a real scumbag. What sort of people are these christians and how do they convince themselves of the things they do? It's a point I've fruitlessly contended with members of my family for many years and I've often
yelled at them about lack of empathy or questioned their ability to ignore what their feelings might be on this alleged judgment day. It may just be my outrage at their smug pleasure that they will be saved while I'm tortured in
an unverifiable future because I am less capable of suspending reality than they are.
Anyway - fuck it. I'm going to play 5 brutals in Command and Conquer. Death to the GLA!
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Great tagline you've got there...
OMG PEDANTRY!
Anyway, any argument concerning the whole omnibenevolence-vs-eternal torture thing is more a critique of a bad, internally inconsistent work of fiction than it is a reason to "reject" anything.
You're perfectly right. It just bugs me. Evangelical upbringings replete with threats are painfully difficult to exorcise.
And I lost the game - the bastards came at me all at once.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Well I have to admit that christians and whatnot thinking we're going to burn in hell does get me riled up. I've even chased off otherwise friendly theists on this site by picking a fight with them over this belief.
Maybe it's because I was indoctrinated in childhood and use to shake in fear of hell as a kid. That shit kind of scars you inside.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
I always feel that once they get to this point in their 'argument' that I have done my job and have frustrated them to such a point that they have no other course of action but to pull out the hell card ~ ~ At which point it is even more fun to smile and let them know that their 'god' must be proud of the message they have attempted to relay(they will most definitely be in their divine entity's good graces~letting them know that unless they have anything else that can prove the need to believe, that hell is the only answer for an unbeliever! End of conversation~it will make them more upset, which is pretty fulfilling
Slowly building a blog at ~
http://obsidianwords.wordpress.com/
Im sure theists see it more as if you murder someone you will go to jail. Its the consiquenses of your actions... it is just what happens. Im sure you wouldn't object to someone saying you will go to jail if you kill someone. You will go to hell if you don't believe in god. Its sort of a threat but really its more a warning. A pointless warning though
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
Well, I think that pretty much everyone has dealt with a would be bully at least once. There are a few things that you can do when this happens. You can be a pusswad and roll over to the bully, you can ignore him or you can stand up to him. Either the second or third option is the way to deal with the bully depending on the specific situation.
Well, in that a threat of hell is still a threat and an attempt to intimidate, I would call it bullying. Granted that it is an indirect threat but even so, it is still a threat. You are right though that it is really childish.
Honestly, it comes off to me as a “my dad can beat up your dad” type of move. The problem is that in this case, I don't have a dad and never did. And since the theist bully doesn't have a dad either, he is ranting from a delusion.
Really, I take that move as pathetic. The root of pathetic and theistic being similar, probably an apathetic response is called for.
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In the context of a logical argument, would threatening some one with hell for not accepting your beliefs constitute an appeal to force?
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
It took me longer than it should have to drill down to your last line...Nice one.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
TYVM
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I'd say it's psychological bullying. Threats of force can have the same effect as force itself.
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
1. IF it is true, and there is a hell, then it's not bullying to say that if you die you're going to hell, then it's just true and honest. (Perhaps a harsh truth, but it should be preferred to a lie).
2. IF there is no hell, again IF, then it's a (typically) sincere and well-meaning person who's just wrong, which really shouldn't be considered bullying. You can continue feeling sad and sorry for them.
3. If, however, in your mind, there truly is no hell, and if Christians know that there is no hell, then, logically, and in the context of a debate, of course it's bullying. It's merely saying something threatening in a pathetic attempt to get you to change your position, based on fear and nothing else.
But, then again, if the person truly believes in Hell, then it shouldn't be seen as bullying, it should be seen as kind and compassionate. You can still disagree, and think them foolish, you could wish them to stop and ask them politely to do so. But if a person truly believes that what comes next for those who die without loving Christ and following His message is an eternity of separation from love and life and joy, then maybe they're just trying to do what they can so that you don't share in the suffering of eternity without rest or peace.
Hell isn't a punishment for unbelief. It's the natural state of an eternal soul in the presence of a God who exists simply as He's always existed, He's a consuming fire.
What comes next then, should be, probably is something like "Why then would you worship a God who creates eternal beings, whom He supposedly "loves", and then, when they don't do everything He tells them to do, tortures them for all eternity?"
1. When Moses asked God's name so he could tell the children of Israel, God said then should call Him "I am the I am", which essentially means "I am the self-existent and ever-the-same One. I exist as I have always existed and I can't be any different than that which I already am. I cannot change myself." (As an aside, this does not mean that He cannot add attributes to Himself, as in when Christ took on a human nature, it means that He cannot alter characteristics or qualities which He has and forever will possess.)
2. God wanted to create beings like Himself. He thought this place would be better, when all is said and done, with humanity in it. Though, there are a couple of conditions. (Just like this universe exists with fundamental and unchangeable laws, God cannot create something without a real cause and effect taking place).
A. He had to create us to be eternal, so that we could be forever with Him. (this doesn't mean that our bodies have to be eternal, just our souls (which, granted, sounds like a made-up word to most of you)). He cannot
create eternal beings and then have them not be eternal beings. Once you're created human, you're eternal.
B. For you to exist as you are, you have to have an absolutely free will. The choices you make are your choices. For you to be otherwise would mean for you to be essentially a program or a robot. God does not desire
the worship of robots, their worship would inherently have no value whatsoever.
3. Because God is a CONSUMING FIRE (an aspect the Gnostics fixated upon), He cannot exist otherwise. One of the qualities of this particular aspect of His is that this "consuming fire" metaphor is merely an outworking of
His holiness. Holiness is a word meaning His sin-less-ness. Sin cannot and does not exist in His presence. "Sin" being defined as anything that is directly opposed to His nature. God is Truth and in Him there is no shadow
of turning. Therefore lying is a sin, because He cannot partake in lies. Lying is only inherently "evil" because it is inherently opposed to the nature of God.
A. This consuming fire God cannot have sin in His presence. Things that are opposed to His nature are consumed by His very being. Mountains melt like wax at the presence of the LORD. The chaff is consumed. This is as
good an understanding of Hell as anything else. It is not that God tortures people for daring to disagree or not understand with Him. It is that He cannot be otherwise.
B. For all have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. right? you're probably all familiar with that one. In our natural state, because of our tendency to do what we want, what feels good to us, what seems right in
our own eyes, we are all removed from His presence (a place where to exist there one must be in complete agreement with everything that He is - this is almost exclusively what the entire Old Testament is about
(excepting the Tabernacle/Temple, Priestly rites which were the way God ordained to allow us back into His presence).
4. You might disagree with it, but it's logically tenable (when given the numerous number of premises).
5. What is you are allowed to disagree with is a God who decided to make a humanity knowing full-well that many of them would not choose His way and He would have no choice but to consume them. He couldn't have made us any other way. I wouldn't be me, and you wouldn't be you. My guess is that most of you like you, so you're probably somewhat happy with your lives. What you're not happy with is a God who will let you be with Him or will allow you to live forever without Him, and moreover a God who made you with all of these conditions without even asking you first whether you'd like to be or not.
This sounds like someone talking about the star trek universe. All very interesting but completely divorced from reality or usefulness.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
With this expansion of god's lame description of himself as himself.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
I think that most run of the mill Christians are not intentionally bullying or threatening when they talk about hell. It doesn't take much empathy to want to keep your fellow man from eternal suffering. People with lots of empathy probably feel very strongly. It's as if there's a bridge that the Christian believes is unstable, and will give way if stepped on, hurtling the pedestrians to their death. Good people will generally do their best to prevent people from walking on the bridge.
However, I think it's perfectly legitimate to say that the dogma itself is threatening and bullying. It's hard for me to think of any way to describe hell except as a threat and a bully tactic.
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
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Technically, it is an appeal to force (an informal fallacy). But in formal logic, it's a valid argument, but not sound. In order for it to be a sound argument, the premises would have to be true. In my experience, christians usually beg the question when they attempt to prove their premises.
which is why I firmly believe in going ballistic on religious nuts that start saying stuff like that. they usually back down, just like most ignorant, belligerent cowards.
My favorite reply would be that their relatives have an equal chance of being down there with me, since at least a few of them will have sinned and won't be going to heaven. Hopefully at least a few sinned enough to deserve Hellfire, and they'll be burning along with me. Or the person himself, if it turns out Allah is the one true God and I've not believed rather than believe in a rival lesser God.
Hmm...
This is a difficult question, so I applaud your temerity. My personal contention is that empty-headed threats are ultimately revealed for exactly what they are: a desperate. grasping attempt at a logical straw that has long since collapsed. Personally, I am not offended by this injection because it tends to validate my interpretations of the christian dogma: do as you're told/we say...or else! A philosophical construct built on these foundations is the equivalent of a childish fantasy evolved from the denouement of conflated abrogation of logic: utterly worthless. As such, my question to you would be whether you feel that the "threats" you mentioned are real or imaginary constructs (I suspect I know the answer). I am not trying to be difficult, but I fail to see how the imaginary prognostications of future doom are relevant to one who finds their premise laughable.
Regards,
UE
I believe damnation threats to a bigoted, public imposition.... before anyone should be able to make that claim and not have religious seperatism catogorized as the same type of "hate speech" that racism, sexism or agism is... Theists should at least be required to prove the existance of Hell....
However, that might pose a slight problem for them...
www.RichWoodsBlog.com
But I am burdened by my upbringing in small churches with no sunday school. I sat through hysterical fire and brimstone sermons from the age of 3 or 4 and the fact dad was giving them and mum is a former missionary to the mid-east meant there was no respite from the madness at home. I think in my case this threat was loaded on at the bios level. I can run patches but the earliest little person I ever was is stuck with the fear of an impossibly violent and immoral being my rationality simply can't accept. My theist brothers get a lot of satisfaction listening to me foaming with hatred for the god I don't believe in.
Needless to say if any half-wit theist tells my kids about hell I'll fucking shoot them. Family included.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck