We have fleas!
Offline Fleas? Why fleas?
Richard Dawkins's response to theologian Alister McGrath's writing a book called "The Dawkins Delusion?" was to quote poet William B. Yeats about his imitators:
You say, as I have often given tongue
In praise of what another's said or sung,
'Twere politic to do the like by these;
But was there ever dog that praised his fleas?
That has become a running gag on RD's site:
Was there ever dog that praised his fleas?
Flea Circus!
The Flea Circus Invites a Newcomer!
The Fleas Are Multiplying!
Note how several of the authors have imitated not only Richard Dawkins's title, but also his cover art -- and how Sam Harris has also gotten that treatment.
And we at the RRS also have fallen victim:
http://www.rationalresponders.org
http://www.righteousresponders.com
The first one has a few YouTube creationist videos, but not much else, while the second one is much more active.
The books:
Richard Dawkins:
Mike King: The God Delusion Revisited
Richard Grigg: Beyond the God Delusion
Alister McGrath: The Dawkins Delusion?
David Robertson: The Dawkins Letters
Andrew Wilson: Deluded by Dawkins?
Thomas Green, O.P., A Catholic Replies to Professor Dawkins
David, Reuben Stone: Atheism is False: Richard Dawkins And The Improbability Of God Delusion
The Argument against Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion
"The Intelligent Community": The iPod Tutor: The Argument Against Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion
John Cornwell: Darwin's Angel: an Angelic Response to The God Delusion
James A. Beverley: The God Solution
Sam Harris:
Vox Day: The Irrational Atheist: Dissecting the Unholy Trinity of Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens
Joel McDurmon: The Return of the Village Atheist
Michael Patrick Leahy: Letter to an Atheist
R. Chris Metcalf: Letter to a Christian Nation: Counter Point
Douglas Wilson: Letter from a Christian Citizen
More general fleas:
Becky Garrison: The New Atheist Crusaders and Their Unholy Grail: The Misguided Quest to Destroy Your Faith
David Marshall: The Truth Behind the New Atheism: Responding to the Emerging Challenges to God and Christianity
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"Challenging Atheist Myths"
Wait.... we have myths?
Frank Walton is one of our fleas.
(that'll look funny when it shows up in google)
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Theists think our logical/rational thinking (a part of the scientfic process) as a way to knowledge is contrary to faith and therefore must be false (i.e. a myth). If the path to knowledege using Science was the only true method, the _____(insert favored religious book here) would have said so.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. - Seneca
I'd thought of including the "Challenge the Blasphemy" site and other such responses to the Blasphemy Challenge as fleas, but I was not sure whether they'd really qualify. Also, there is a response to "The God Who Wasn't There" called "The God Who Was There"; I wondered about that one's fleaishness also.
And as to Frank Walton, he does not seem to be plagiarizing the RRS's style or trying to get fame by associating himself with the RRS even as he opposes it.
I agree with you on that, but I agree with Brian that it will look funny on Google.
This topic is interesting to me. I never realized how often Christians yoink other people's ideas... but now that I think about it, I can think of all kinds of shit... is this yet more proof that fundies, generally speaking, are not good at thinking?
A place common to all will be maintained by none. A religion common to all is perhaps not much different.
Immitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Those theists must think us atheists have some good ideas.
Newsflash: Saturday September 22nd, an email to the Rational Response Squad identifies a new flea found on the back of the dog known as Reason... http://www.myrationalresponse.com/
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I just discovered that two responses to the Blaphemy Challenge,http://www.challengeblasphemy.comhttp://www.challengetheblasphemy.comare now defunct, while http://www.blasphemychallenge.com continues to exist. It's nice to have some fun at the expense of Xians who brag about how enduring and persistent their religion is.
Has anyone bothering to spend money on and read these books yet? I'm not about to lay out money for any of them but I'm curious if anyone has as of yet.
Morte alla tyrannus et dei
*** duplicate snipped ***
The Righteous Responders have degenerated into a blog that purports to be written by Mr. G. himself, Creator and Ruler of this whole wide Universe.
It contains lots of Bible-thumping and atheist-bashing, like
I suppose that writing a blog is easier than running a radio show, but this is an absolutely absurd come-down. And I cannot find any hint of who is running the site; even "whois" on the site's domain name does not say very much.
Nothing like a beautiful contradiction.
Man you said it. The those three "arguements" are always odd to me ... beside the word 'fool' I guess I don't see how any of it is an insult. Did I miss something?
We have over 50 fleas. We've compiled a long list and will make a jpg to show with the Dawkins and Harris sites.
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I am looking forward to seeing that image.
In the meantime, I've checked on the Righteous Responders again, and I've found:
It has changed from being a RRS imitation to being a blog whose author imagines God doing some blogging and now back to that RRS imitation. And an odd one at that, with a clip showing a fake female newscaster announcing the site with a synthesized voice. "News" links to http://www.prophecyheadlines.com/ which lists a lot of headlines of strife and disasters and the like as evidence that the Rapture will soon happen. "Forum" links to a messageboard called "righteousresponders.com - Enter a short description here" with the message "Sorry, but this board is currently unavailable. Please try again later." "Links" and "Contact Us" give a "Not Found" message. The Prophecy Headlines site has under "News Staff" only a News Director and a News Editor, and under "Forums" a Letters from God blog.
The Righteous Responders home page has a computer-assembled "newscaster" whom I call Bizarro Kelly:
She's a set of sprites with a synthesized voice.
And I hope that the "real" Kelly is not upset with me using her avatar in this fashion; if she would prefer another image of herself be used, I will redo this picture with that new one.
I guess imitation is the sincerest form of flattery
Does anyone have any way of saving that Bizarro Kelly video?
Aside from that, I checked out the site credited in that video - http://www.sitepal.com - "Avatars & Animated Characters - Create Virtual Talking Characters for your Website, Flash Movies, and Blogs!". I found from "Demo It" that the Righteous Responders used the "Angela" model with default settings (click on "More Models" in the demo window).
And I will concede that I myself have been a bit of a flea with that "bizarro" title. I first saw it in the username of someone who comments at Richard Dawkins's site: "Bizarro Dawkins". Then I looked up Bizarro in Wikipedia and found the comic-book-universe Bizarro World to be an inverse of ours in various ways -- Bizarro Flash is the opposite of our Flash; he is VERY slow.
The Righteous Responders have changed format yet again, to King of Terrors. "Will He Be Your Terror Or Your Safety? Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; 2 Co 5:11". They have a Stickam room and pages linking to various YouTube videos, like from Repent America and Pilgrim Baptist Church.
The Righteous Responders are back again at http://righteousresponders.com without a redirection to http://kingofterrors.com
They have a few videos, like "Atheists Have No Morals", a slideshow featuring some of the more unkind comments that they had received. Does that mean that Jesus Christ had no morals because of what he had said about those scribes and Pharisees?
And there are articles like "Evolution is Religion, Not Science" (religious believers using "religion" as a dirty word???), "Proof That Evolution Is A Hoax" (humanity's recorded history only going back 5000 years), "Cambrian Explosion Disproves Evolution", "Charles Darwin's Hidden Agenda for Science", stuff on Philip Pullman and The Golden Compass, etc.
The site has a messageboard, but it has only a few posts in it, like about The Golden Compass.
Does anyone want to try to guess how long this incarnation will last?
Hemant Mehta has reported on a new sort of flea: the Christian OUT Campaign, a response to the atheist one:
The "OUT" in the Xian version stands for “Observable Underlying Testimony”, elaborated as
have none of these people read the scarlet letter?
the big C doesn't even make sense...
The "C" is also stupid because it misses the fucking point. You can't have an "out" campaign with Christianity. That would be like a bunch of assholes trying to have a "straight pride" parade to compete with the gay pride parade. The only thing it proves is that you're an asshole.
Also, "straight pride" sounds like "straight edge", which is totally lame.
As an aside... Bizarro Kelly is actually kind of hott. I have a weakness for brunettes and a fetish for women in business attire. If I was a pixelated man in a suit, I would totally film an office porn with her.
A place common to all will be maintained by none. A religion common to all is perhaps not much different.
You people are far from alone in concluding that this sinks to new depths of lameness; Xianity already has some well-known symbols. In post 197 in the Richard Dawkins response thread, emmet linked to his/her response:
The latest, from http://www.righteousresponders.com
So if you make her say her name backwards will she go back to her own dimension?
That wasn't Bizzarro it was Myxelplic (or however it was spelled.)
It seems to me that these books are getting out of hand. A handful of books debunking religion and we end up getting three times as many responses. And this from people who continously take Dawkins, Hitchens, and Harris out of context, and rehash the same arguments in just about each and every book. I've read David Marshall's "The Truth Behind the New Atheism" and David Aikman's "The Delusion of Disbelief" and trust me, it isn't pretty. These two guys alone make so many misquotes and errors I'm shocked these books are actually passed off as books that refute anything, let alone, the "new atheism."
If anyone is interested in the content of these books I've found Aikman's on the Google book search (some pages are not readable) and I've also written extensive refutations of both these books on my blog if anyone would like to see the pathetic arguments they used. They can be found at the following:
http://arizonaatheist.blogspot.com/2007/10/review-of-book-truth-behind-new-atheism.html
http://arizonaatheist.blogspot.com/2008/07/review-of-david-aikmans-delusion-of.html
Anyone know of any other refutations of these books (and others) on the net? I'd love to see someone else's take on these pathetic attempts at apologetics.
Jesus is not a hippy. Christianity is not something to be trodden on. God is not happy with this whole Rational Response Squad, and I believe all of you would agree, are you following me? I don't want to lose you here. God is the creator and you guys are the creation. You are spitting at God's face with every single propaganda you are sponsoring on this site and else where. I do not hate you guys. I want you to see your folly. It is correct to show people they are wrong and it is possible to show people are wrong without being judgemental, but you are condemned already by your unbelief. Christianity is not psychological at all. It is Truth. Jesus was not insane, he is not a liar, he was not on drugs nor a drunkard. He is God. God is not a liar either. Richard Dawkins is a person and a child of God as well, but he is wrong in his beliefs and if he stays that way up through his death then he will find out the consequences. Knowing that one is wrong and realizing it and admitting it is the only possible turning point of turning from folly.
Please look at the mirror of the Ten Commandments and see your sins as they are and turn from them. You are all very nice people with good intensions and I am sure you intend good things with this site but it is in the wrong and I want you to see it. Please please please turn from sin and look at the Ten Commandments daily and please do not be arrogant and prideful. Turn from sin and trust the Savior to save you from eternal Hellfire and brimstone. God Bless
Yay. Go drive by assholes.
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
Just for the Hades of it, I decided to search for "rational response" and "rational responders" in Facebook
I got about 50 hits, including a sizable number of ones unconnected to us, for the first one, but only 2 for the second one.
I wonder what a search of MySpace would reveal.
Try the link now. http://www.challengeblasphemy.com
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