Well, since Hitch isn't going to hold a press conference on CNN or Fox now, I'd say this idiots arguments are hollow.

"My daddy warned you, you only have yourself to blame"

Yea yea yea, all the major three use their pet deities to threaten others. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

We all know the truth that it was Thor who smoted Hitchens with a lightening bolt.

Bow to Thor or get struck by lightening!

I'd say the founders whom of some were some mix of Christianity/deism. They were the first big push to say "Maybe we shouldn't take religion so seriously as to make law out of it".

But other than that, really haven't seen much before or after them. We need modern "Paines and Jefferxons".

240 years? Shit. I'd thought they'd done something since then.

Maybe not. I can't think of anything anyway.

Actually, now that we are talking about Hitchens, a lady here said something about him the day the news broke.

She mentioned he died to some of the other women in customer support and then referred to him as "that atheist" and that he was in hell now.

I just ignored it.  I'm not going to raise any hackles at work.

Well some people have different moral codes.

I usually try and wait until the grass has taken root over a person's grave before I start criticizing them in death.

It's common courtesy.  People always have those that love them.  Let them grieve a little before you start talking shit about their loved one.

Again, context.

I don't think most people in the west wait until Kim Jong Ill died to call him rightfully the dickhead he was.

Now BOTH Hitchens and Falwell were public figures and in the west we value the criticism of public figures, it is what prevents us from becoming like North Korea.

Even when Kim was alive you couldn't criticize him. I cant imagine what his dissenters are going though now not being able to call him the tyrant and asshole he was.

Speaking ill of the dead is not a crime anymore than saying Jesus is fiction is a crime. The courtesy only comes in CONTEXT of who, what, where, when and why. Not in terms of absolutes. Kim Jong Ill demanded absolutes.

Again, Hitchens would care more about the bad use of logic than their opinion of him.

We don't get theists to see us as individuals by expecting each other to behave like sheep. I think there are plenty of theists who can do the same and already do the same for us. Hitchens himself as "in your face" as he was had plenty of complements after his death from his theist friends and plenty from the media world which he was a huge part of.

My point in THIS has more to WHY you protect dissent as a means to protect eveyrone's rights by not speaking in terms of absolutes. Which is why context matters.

Again, in the context of actually being face to face at a funeral with the mourners, yes, you bite your tongue. But in the context of a public figure, we have to protect our right to criticize them even in death, otherwise we are no better than the fascist states like iran and North Korea, where you cant even criticize them when they are alive.

And the value I am defending here in this post is not an atheist value, it is a Constitutional value because our Constitution protects dissent and even blasphemy.

One of my favorite letters from the Founders was one between Jefferson and Adams. Jefferson was responding to the complaints of Adams that the media and public were not respecting their elected leaders. Jefferson in a much more polite response that I am about to bluntly curtail in summery said , "Look dude, what do you think the Declaration of Independence was? It was "fuck you" to the King. Part of why we fought that war was so we could speak freely about our leaders".

Now, this recognition of freedom of speech is also something I know theists value to, so by typing this an they reading this it WILL break those stereotypes you say theists should not have of us because they value it too. And you may also know that as "in your face" Hitchens was, he too saw Jefferson as a hero to the concept of protection of dissent, and he wrote a book about him too.

"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions" Thomas Jefferson, who also equated the birth of Jesus as being the same Category of Minerva being born out of the brain of Jupiter. And he was a deist, not an atheist.

So when you say "Dont speak ill of the dead", IT DEPENDS and should only be treated in a case by case contextual basis.

Well if we are going to be all contextual I guess I need your context.

Why do you speak out about religion?  Just to spew vitriol or to diminish religious belief?

I'm not sure how the story relates to being an atheist activist.

Let's say I was a well known atheist blogger with tens of thousands of followers.  I and a prominent religious leader have a long running fued going back and forth with each other over religion.  And then one day he dies.

If I hop up on my blog and say, "Ha, ha.  You're dead you dumb theist.  You aren't in heaven like you thought.  You're just gone, dumbass."

Well what are other Christians who are waffling on theism going to think?

Probably something like, "Wow, what a callous, mean spirited asshole.  I guess it's true that Atheists are evil and have no sense of morality.  Well I don't want to be like that so I'm going to keep going to church and stop trying to second guess religion."

If, on the other hand, I wrote.  "So-and-so and I did not see eye to eye on many issues.  However, I believe he was a well intentioned man and he proved to the world that he was a tireless and brave defender of what he thought was right and good for the world.  I offer his loved ones my sincere and heartfelt condolences during this time of grief and hope they are able to comfort themselves with the warm memories and cherished stories they share of this kind man."

Boom, bitches.  What do you think the waffling Christian would think then?

Maybe something like, "Wow, that was a really nice thing for him to say about him even after all those years of them fighting.  I think it's must be wrong that atheists can't have morals or be good people.  Those other Christians are wrong when they say you need God to be a good person.  Maybe those Christians are wrong about a lot things."

Who cares about the dead guy?  He doesn't matter anymore.  He's gone, and can't add anymore harm than whatever trash he left behind throughout his life.

My purpose, as an atheist blogger, would be to convince more and more people that atheism is the best course for having a truly good world.  That religion actually causes so many problems, and hate, and division.  And I'm not going to convince anyone by spitting on a dead man.  All I'd do is repel them.

Free speech?  Is that what you are arguing about?  I'm arguing about how to best reach people to diminish religion in our society.

Of course anyone can say whatever they want, as it should be.

But if you are trying to help get rid of religion, crapping on your religious opponents when news breaks of their death is not going to help you achieve that goal.  You would actually be more of a hidderance to other atheist activists.

I told you so...

They "deserve it"?   haha

They are dead.   You are hurting someone after they are extinguished?  You are making dead people feel sheepish, ashamed of themselves, or shed a tear?  For what end result?  To alter their future behavior?  The dead person's future behavior?

Look, all I'm asking, not just you but myself is "what works for what you are trying to achieve and what does NOT help you to achieve your goals?"

That's all I'm saying.   Go rant and throw a fit and be a huge jerk in front of the world at the exact time to make people COMPLETELY dimiss you, prove your opponents correct in most all third party eyes, and have a blast with it.  The dead guy who will never even know anything about it BECAUSE THE DUDE IS DEAD deserves it, right?

But who is getting screwed?   You're screwing yourself.   You are shooting yourself in the foot.

But you've always been angry.   Heck, I was super angry too back in the day.   But you've alwaysf seemed...I don't know, a different kind of angry.   Like highjack reason type of angry.   A lot of people on this forum taught me things that made me do an about face on my previous views on different topics.

I've never seen you do an about face on anything you had already decided on.  Even when, in my opinion, you didn't make the more convincing argument between you and the other atheist.

Has that happened ever with you?   Can you tell me about that experience?

You just keep on moving in the same direction without altering your course a smidgen like a run-away steamroller regardless of really good points of alternate views that make a lot more rational sense.   And I'm not talking about this discussion.   I remember noticing this about you back in 2008 and 2009 when I wasn't even involved in the discussions.

So you may or may not have an afterlife that you don't need God for? 

Why worship God then? Or are you saying Judaism doesn't?

I love you.  Will you marry me?

(I made the same offer to Brian37, but he hasn't taken me up on it ...)

I would've said... haha that atheist is in hell with Katherine Hepburn, Ghandi, and Buddha.

I know that is your well intended way of saying "Brian, despite your bluster, I like you"

But we are not arguing over likes and dislikes here. I am quite sure outside the issue of religion you are a nice person. But god claims are a serious matter and affect global politics and religion. It is not an issue either you or I should shy away from.

But in the context of this well intended "I like you" answer there are STILL logical fallacies that I cannot agree with.

Why would I want to hang out with a being forever? YOU might not find that boring, but I would. Just as it would get boring if the Redskins never lost a game and won every Super Bowl forever.

And since I already reject the idea of "free will"(in the theistic sense) when all the major three religions assert an all seeing, all knowing, all powerful being, I find it absurd that I could be myself in a "heaven". I couldn't cuss. I couldn't  get a blow job, even if it were by consent. I couldn't complain to this god about people I liked whom I thought should be up there with me. And on top of that my only goal would be to kiss his ass the entire time.

"Heaven" is not a real place. It is merely a human reflection of our own utopias. Just like god is not real and is merely a fictional super hero in the form of our own protections of our own wishful thinking.

Whoever suggested that Jews, or Muslims, shouldn't help someone who has some manner of disease "because they deserved it" is an absolute idiot.  There are some strains of Christianity which hold that a person who has a disease "doesn't have (enough or any) faith", so perhaps they "deserve" it, but within Judaism (100% certainty) and Islam (pretty close to 100% certainty), helping the sick is a mitzvah (commandment, not just some warm and fuzzy "good deed&quot.

Bikur Cholim (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bikur_cholim) is a COMMANDMENT, which is to say that a person who fails to do such a thing is a Really Bad Jew.

I am aware that Hinduism, for example, has a caste system in which there are people who are presumed to "deserve" misfortune in life because of their lower status, but the Buddha attacked the caste system as ignorant, so I'd be surprised to find that is a belief in Buddhism, but not in Hinduism.

As regards your comments that G-d is (l'havdil) some sort of malicious asshole, I think there are a large enough number of alternatives that saying G-d is "all good" or "all bad" or any such sort of absolute ignores that things really =could= be different.  And you might still complain about them.  To me, your real issue is that if G-d exists, you don't like how G-d set things up.  Which isn't all that worthwhile a reason to reject the notion that G-d exists in the first place.

Funny.   My wife is very possesive of me.  If another woman so much as smiles at me she starts getting agitated.

I'm the opposite.   If some guy hits on my wife or I notice them staring at her chest I just chuckle and think it's amusing.

A)  You can't convince people their ideas about religion are wrong if they don't listen to you.

B)  If you act like an annoying scumbag all the time no one will listen to you.

I seriously doubt that all the homosexuals in Iran have to do, to keep from getting executed for being gay, is yell at people and act like assholes.

It would probably make more Iranians agree with the executions.

I couldn't do that. Went through that one time with one girlfriend and dumped her. I don't know how you do that.

My x left me for other reasons, but I will say when it came to looking, neither of us cared. We both knew the other wasn't going to do anything. I actually got a kick out of guys eyeballing her. The only time she got upset at me looking at other women was in front of her parents, and I admit, not a good place to do that.

We met in college and she would study with other guys. And sometimes she would find me sitting with other female students, never affected her, not even when we were married.

And as far as staring at chests, guys do deserve to get laughed at, even me. We do think down there. It's just that some of us who admit it dont try to make it out to be dirty. It just means we can be very pleasantly distracted.

I am one of those guys who could easily get run over in traffic because I was staring at boobs.

                         I have it easier, at age 56 and weighing 250 pounds  women just don't look at me like they use to; believe it or not.  My wife of 24 years isn't the jelous type,  she truely believes that no woman but her can find me attractive and she might be right. You never did tell me if you liked wine and conversation? 

My ex-wife and I used to go to strip clubs and drop large piles of money.  Strippers are =much= nicer to women than men because they know we're not going to try anything inappropriate ... most of the time.

These days I have to beg the guys I know to drag me along because strip clubs won't let single women in, even if we just wanna have a look.  Most of my friends have either recently had kids, or are recently divorced, and don't have the time or money.

I happen to believe that strip clubs can be good for a marriage, so long as both parties understand that it's just entertainment.  I had a relationship 20+ years ago where we'd go out and do role play with getting picked up.  That was also fun.  And, of course, we'd go home and things would be far more entertaining in the privacy of our own little world.

Well, I strip most days or nights as well.  I just do it before going to bed or taking a shower

Glad to hear it's worked out.  I've never heard of someone who married a stripper they met and had it work out.

If that is you in your avatar, I could go Kosher, you don't look like you have cloven hooves.

"Vitriol"?

That is the world used by people who want their insecurities coddled.

I get sick of humans in general being afraid of bluntness. Some things deserve scorn. Any Muslim claiming that their women shouldn't drive or cant vote DESERVES SCORN.

Anyone claiming that a baby can be born without a second set of DNA deserves scorn.

Susan B. Anthony said it best, "Well behaved women seldom make history"

Ayan Hersi Ali offended people without cussing, her mere blasphemy of Muslim men's treatment of women ALONE was enough to get her death threats and get her documentary maker friend murdered.

THOSE people, not all religious people, but those people, deserve scorn and ridicule and I don't give one fuck what they think.

And even claims, any given claim on any subject, does not deserve taboo status, even if I agree with the civil right to make the claim.

If our species never questioned social norms our species never would have left the caves. I am not going to sugar coat my views on any given claim just because my delivery "might" offend some.

No, I blaspheme to diminish the pedestal of entitlement religions think they have in establishing a pecking order. I don't do it out of hate. I do it because I hate how it divides humanity because it DOES set up a pecking order.

People think I am ugly with just mere words? Humans in our history, do far worse with violence and war precisely because of the taboos they set up. Religion isn't going anywhere anytime soon. But I am damned sure going to treat that collective mentality of all religions like the childish selfish brats they act like. Maybe if I can shame them enough, they wont continue to be the violent pricks they still act like.

When and if religion ever gets to the point it is treated like a mere pass time and not a blood sport, then I will relax. But as long as Christians/Jews/ and Muslims insist on treating the planet like a giant game of capture the flag, infect politics and education, and since I live on this planet too, I am going to do my best to shame them into knocking it off.

"FUCK" and "BULLSHIT" are nothing compared to murdering doctors, lynching blacks, preventing women from voting, dumbing down society with the absurdity of creationism.

I'd say the woman who was murdered on the soccer field at halftime in Afghanistan were alive today would want someone to say FUCK YOUR RELIGION if that is the way you treat women.

So again, CONTEXT, I cant stop people from believing things I hate. I have family and friends and co-workers who make claims I hate. No different to me than my co workers who love soccer and hate the NFL.

But without the ability to cuss the violent assholes out, and blaspheme them and treat them like the pieces of shit they are, there is no way to increase the secular pluralistic neutrality we should maximize. Shame is the only way to neuter the gang mentality.

Furry is here, Cap is here, they haven't run away because of words. I would like to give my believing friends credit to have the maturity that words are just that.

You don't move into the future with taboos or fear.