The Atheist - Agnostic - Non religious thread

Qboyy007 wrote: Xanthous wrote: I have been an Atheist since the age of 11. I was raised in a background where my family wasn't religious per say, but we celebrated the Holidays and the like. Gods were created by man, not the other way around. This is the main piece of logic that convinced me that there wasn't some all-powerful God. Take a look throughout History. Of the numerous Religions that Humans have created throughout the ages, most are recognized as false. Soon enough I guarantee you the Religions that are worshiped today will all be taken as fanciful stories.   I don't feel like making a page-long paragraph giving all my supports for being an Atheist, so I'll just end my post here. Why do people think that if God exists it automatically means it's tied to a religion? You can be a Deist and be nonreligious.

Because a deistic God is so distant and irrelevant to anyone's life it's not very interesting to talk about.

stonebeard wrote: Qboyy007 wrote: Xanthous wrote: I have been an Atheist since the age of 11. I was raised in a background where my family wasn't religious per say, but we celebrated the Holidays and the like. Gods were created by man, not the other way around. This is the main piece of logic that convinced me that there wasn't some all-powerful God. Take a look throughout History. Of the numerous Religions that Humans have created throughout the ages, most are recognized as false. Soon enough I guarantee you the Religions that are worshiped today will all be taken as fanciful stories.   I don't feel like making a page-long paragraph giving all my supports for being an Atheist, so I'll just end my post here. Why do people think that if God exists it automatically means it's tied to a religion? You can be a Deist and be nonreligious.  Because a deistic God is so distant and irrelevant to anyone's life it's not very interesting to talk about.

Can also be made into a drinking game if you are watching a debate.


Edited by KoS - October 08 2009 at 20:27

KoS wrote: Can also be made into a drinking game if you are watching a debate.

Damn I could fill every one of those with the stuff I've heard. But I'll keep it in mind for a drinking game...

I've been an atheist for as long as I can remember but have never been entirely comfortable with that appellation i.e. I reject the metaphysical, the superstitious and the existence of deities but tend to find the term 'atheist' carries with it a lot of excess baggage.

By way of example, I do take exception to the rather tired rhetoric trotted out by many atheists when confronted with those of a spiritual inclination:

I respect your faith (but don't share it) and provided your religion is a non-violent one we can co-exist quite happily etc

What exactly does the underlined caveat mean ? Are all atheists assumed to be pacifists now ? Is secularism the preserve of peace-time ? Have the centuries of carnage and victimisation perpetuated under the flag of a spiritual agenda been airbrushed out of history ? There are far more corpses in any moral crusade than there ever has been hate crimes period. Are there any significant world faiths whose histories do not resemble a low budget splatter movie ? Toleration does not include denial....

Phew...To lighten the mood somewhat I personally believe in salvation through art i.e. it is through our creative works that we become, in a purely aesthetic sense, immortal.

Equality 7-2521 wrote: Are you suggesting a non-violent religious person should be looked down on because another person used their religion as a justification for murder?

Nope, I'm not suggesting anything of the sort but stating that all the major world faiths either espouse annihilation of the infidel or turn a blind eye to the misguided interpretations of scripture by extremists eg

If you can find a leading Irish priest who openly condemns the atrocities perpetuated by the IRA, be my guest.

Similarly, there is a provision within Islamic law which sanctions the killing of an individual who is deemed to be an enemy of their faith (it's called a fatwa)

In effect a non-violent religion is about as credible as low calorie poison

Is typing 'New York Asian Escorts' the internet equivalent of bleeping out all the swear words ?

Sounds to me like a brothel that offers home deliveries

ExittheLemming wrote: Equality 7-2521 wrote: Are you suggesting a non-violent religious person should be looked down on because another person used their religion as a justification for murder? Nope, I'm not suggesting anything of the sort but stating that all the major world faiths either espouse annihilation of the infidel or turn a blind eye to the misguided interpretations of scripture by extremists eg If you can find a leading Irish priest who openly condemns the atrocities perpetuated by the IRA, be my guest. Similarly, there is a provision within Islamic law which sanctions the killing of an individual who is deemed to be an enemy of their faith (it's called a fatwa) In effect a non-violent religion is about as credible as low calorie poison

Dean wrote: All three Abrahamic religions are essentially non-violent and only condone violence in defence. The problem comes when that is used as a pretext for starting or continuing violence.     ps: A fatwā is not a death sentence - it is just a ruling and it's scope is much broader than that and is equivalent to a Papal Bull, for example one fatwā simply calls for the boycotting of American and Israeli goods. Similarily Jihad does not necessarily mean "holy war" - it means "effort" or "struggle" and can refer to a persons inner struggle against their own selfish desires.

Could such a pretext have plea-bargained for the invasion and conquer of the Eastern Orthodox Byzantine Empire by Muslims to be reduced to an act of self-defence ? (Tenuous methinks) Similarly, would you sanction the idea that the latter aggression provided a pretext for the subsequent Crusades ? (Very likely)
It's interesting to note that the church sanctioned these campaigns and also used recruiting methods chillingly similar to those deployed in the middle east
i.e. volunteers were offered remission of past sins cf martyrdom

I have no quibble with violence as a means of self-defence, but I do have precisely zero tolerance for any world faith that has the ability to sanction the murder or torture of those whose views do not correlate with its own orthodoxy e.g. regardless of how disrespectful or blasphemous you consider the written words of Salman Rushdie's the Satanic Verses to be, freedom of speech must override the pious cruelty of intolerant clerics.

The fact that fatwas are not exclusively sentences to death is utterly spurious if ONLY JUST ONE IS.

Similarly, the several  inquisitions pursued by the Catholic Church display a paranoid and untrammelled bloodlust which surely could not have been countenanced by any papal bull ?.
Is there any evidence that the senior clergy were either aware of the criminality employed or took steps to try to stem the suffering of victims who were in the main, those lonely, vulnerable types that the medieval god fearing souls took sadistic pleasure in defiling ? (This is not one of my habitually rhetorical questions, I genuinely don't know)

I think the FBI got it right when they complied a report on alleged satanic child abuse in the morally panicked USA of the 1980's. The report's findings concluded as follows:

Satanism is every other religion apart from your own

Your command of history is clearly extensive Dean and thanks for a far more gracious style of delivery than my own. I thought your remarks about the covert agenda behind the 4th Crusade were very interesting as it has striking parallels with the sort of populist manipulation deployed by modern corporations as a means to protecting their own profiteering ends (even in the face of moral dilemmas).

I now just need to find a priest willing to badmouth the IRA.