You have to be stupid to believe in god, and other myths found on DU

[cali]

Oh, nonsense. Dietrich Bonhoeffer. William Coffin Sloan. Thomas Merton. Read these folks and get back to me.

People who proseletize deserve all the shit I can dish out. More nonsense. I've had many a pleasant visit with Mormons and Jehovah's witnesses. I've never felt the need to be rude. Usually I just enjoy challenging them (Apologies to Malaise, who I love.)

[BlooInBloo]

1. There's no such thing as "challenging" people who have already given up the game of rationality.

[spoony]

2. I'm disappointed

that you weren't able to cram "white unity" into this somehow. Usually you pull it off. Not well, but at least you give it a go.

[BlooInBloo]

21. I'm hungover - not firing on all cylinders atm. :P

[cali]

28. white unity? what the fuck are you talking about, dear?

I've never used any such phrase in my life. Not even close. not here and not anywhere. You pull nothing off well. pathetic, honey.

[Crunchy Frog]

38. I think that post was directed at BlooInBloo, and not you.

[spoony]

58. Quite right, quite right.

[NNN0LHI]

6. Attempting to do so is equivalent to mental masturbation

It always boils down to my god who lives in the clouds is better than your god who lives in the clouds.

Might as well be discussing the reality of Santa Claus with them.

Don

[SidneyCarton]

59. Believe what you want, I don't care

We'll figure out who's right (if anyone) when we die. If that makes me mentally ill, then so be it.

[undeterred]

42. And no sense "challenging" people who are anti-religion bigots either.

[AlCzervik]

3. Lecture # 1,312,498 or is it 1,312,499?

[seemslikeadream]

8. yes it appears to be

[malaise]

10. 1,400,000 n/t

[Bluebear]

14. We MUST be over 2,000,000 served by now. nt

[AlCzervik]

15. someone needs to update the sign.

:hi:

[Tangerine LaBamba]

4. What's your point?

It seems circular and self-involved. Was there any substance to your post?

[malaise]

11. Check the supermarket thread n/t

[Muttocracy]

18. uh oh, have you become a DU legend

henceforth to be known as author of the "supermarket thread"?

The responses makes little sense to me as it's about half "ignore" :shrug:

[malaise]

19. LOL

Some are fall down funny.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

16. You must be new to DU.

Circular, self-involved, and with no real point or substance whatsoever is what Cali does.

She's everything to DU the blond woman having the last laugh here is to this little hot tub party:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=a8U0HxhR2Bc&feature=related

[Tangerine LaBamba]

29. I am new

OK, thanks. I just thought maybe I was missing something.

[cali]

31. and inane and ugly little personal attacks are what inflated little Mr. J. does.

[Boojatta]

44. Mr_Jefferson_24 does what the very greatest thinkers on DU do...

teach the One Great Truth to all who visit the September 11 forum.

[Boojatta]

43. I am confident that the Original Post would be clear to me even if I were new to DU.

Presuming that there is actually something in the Original Post itself that merits your strong criticism ...

Presuming that it is neither the topic of the Original Post nor the name of the thread creator that provokes your contempt...

... I hope that you will set aside a bit of time to create a good thread on the same topic.

Of course, that is presuming that creating something good is an activity that appeals to you. I don't know.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

54. I remain hopeful, but not especially confident, that one day you will...

...finally somehow manage to construct an at least semi-coherent post -- doesn't appear too likely that it's gonna happen today though.

Oh well, maybe tomorrow, Boojatta.

[Boojatta]

57. I admit that there are many flaws in my posts,

but I find it very hard to believe that extracting a coherent question from them is beyond your abilities. I think that you lack the desire to extract something coherent.

[exothermic]

5. William Coffin Sloan?

:silly:

[JerseygirlCT]

47. William Sloane Coffin is I think who was meant.

Name was turned around a little.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Sloane_Coffin

[madrchsod]

7. well that completely confused me......

thanks for the bonhoeffer and merton names since i`ve never heard of them before. i remember sloan from those days which now are many years ago..

[melody]

9. People who are stupid enough to assume they know everything

Are as irritating to me as believers in god.

[parasim]

12. That's exactly how I feel.

Thinking that your know for sure there is a god or thinking that you know for sure there is not a god, is equal to me.

[melody]

13. Precisely n/t

[emilyg]

20. Yep.

[hedgehog]

53. So agnostics are superior to either atheists of believers?

A new form of snobbery! My day is complete!

[Bluebear]

17. ....

<high five>

[sarge43]

22. In an universe that is composed of 97% dark matter and energy (undetectable),

we who have existed for during less than 1% of the age of that universe know precisely dick.

[melody]

25. Bingo

In the words of Robert Anton Wilson, "anyone who thinks they know what the hell is going on is full of shit".

[JerseygirlCT]

49. Good point! nt

[eShirl]

23. willfully gullible, perhaps, but certainly not stupid. n/t

[YellowRubberDuckie]

24. Nice.

Misread the post. But I totally agree.
Duckie

[LostInAnomie]

26. You don't have to be...

... but it helps.

[Marr]

27. Here's the thing-- too many religious people seem to view honest discussion as an attack on their

religion.

I would never call someone stupid simply because they're religious, nor would I mock a person's religion. Some of my favorite people are religious. Friends, I mean.

However, if any person wishes to discuss the subject with me, I will offer my own views. There seems to be this attitude amongst religious people that simply challenging their religious claims is the same thing as disrespecting their religion. It isn't. If you can offer your opinion, I can offer mine.

[Q3JR4]

39. Yep,

you can argue about which politician you like/dislike, you can argue over progressive/regressive taxes, you can even argue over whether chocolate or vanilla is the best flavor of ice cream. Somewhere in the encyclopedia that is human existence in a library of 100 miles of books, religious folk decided that religion (and ONLY religion) is off limits for discussion or argument.

That's a bit of strangeness I'd like someone to explain to me.

Q3JR4.

Don't ask me, I'm just along for the ride

[JerseygirlCT]

55. I completely agree with you!

And that back and forth - from a position beginning in respect for the other person - is usually very interesting, and does a world of good toward a goal of toleration.

If we're in the midst of a philosophical discussion of belief/non-belief, you betcha I want to hear your opinions, even if, maybe especially if, they're different than my own.

But you won't find me abusing your mental processes, or making blanket assumptions about you based on my preconceived notions of your positions. I won't tell you your atheism is at the root of the world's evil, either. Because that's simply an indefensible position. The converse, of course, is also true.

I don't doubt there are those religious people who behave as you suggest. But they are NOT the majority, and they are most definitely not the majority you'd find here. If you challenge my views, and I find I cannot support or defend them (to my satisfaction, of course, not to yours!), then there's probably some discomfort, but it's a great sign that I've hit on an area in which further thinking is required! THIS may be what happens to those who object to any challenge. They're not ready to really look at what they believe, and so it's easier to oppose than to consider.

But, as I said, that's not necessarily the way many major faith traditions work. And it would be dangerous to assume that's shared by all religious people. That's if what one is going for is some sort of accuracy, not just a handy straw man, you know?

[El Pinko]

30. There is no god as far as I'm concerned, but believing in it is not stupid...

...those of us who don't believe all end up just as dead as those who do in the end, so if the belief makes the interim more bearable for the believer, that can hardly be characterized as "stupid".

...but from my standpoint there is no reason for belief, I am incapable of believing in something for which I have never seen any compelling evidence , and that being the case, feigning such a belief in order to help bolster the faith of others would not fulfill any emotional needs for me.

As for proselytizers. what do you consider "rude"? I tell them "no thank you, I don't do religion". Is that rude?

[cali]

32. first, in answer to your question, no that's not even a little bit rude in my book

Secondly, although not religious myself, I recognize that many fine people are.

[Q3JR4]

41. Not rude at all.

When I get proselytizers at my door and they attempt to tell me how they just KNOW their religion is the right one, I reach over and pick a random religious book (from a collection that includes the Book of Mormon, The Qur'an--English translation and original Arabic, the Bhagavad Gita, the Bible--King James and new standard, and the Satanic Bible--which is crap but always good for lively discussion) and point out that that particular sect believes that THEIR religion is the right one.

I try to keep the whole thing amicable, but I also think that if someone comes at you with their holy book blaring you have the right to defend yourself. Even if that means stepping on toes.

Q3JR4.

[SidneyCarton]

60. Having been one of those to come to the door with the Book of Mormon,

I learned to preach to those who are interested, if you aren't interested, then I was wasting your time, and you were wasting mine.

[JerseygirlCT]

48. I don't think that's rude. I tell them pretty much the same:

"no thanks, I'm all set". And I'm a religious person.

[Edweird]

33. Dumb? Not because they believe. Weak and/or scared is more like it.

Seeking approval from anyone is lame, even more so when that entity is "invisible".

[Marr]

36. I don't think that's true at all.

Well, it probably is for many-- but it's not necessarily so.

If I had to take a guess, I'd say that religiosity is baked into a person's thinking at a very early age, and is nearly impossible to shed. Like mixing a little vanilla into a cake mix. You can never get it out-- it's just there, ingrained in their thought process.

The person may be very intelligent, very brave, even an independent thinker-- and yet still cling to their religious beliefs. I can think of no other explanation, myself. I've known some very sharp people who were devoutly religious Muslims and Christians. They were all raised in the church from a very early age.

[Gabi Hayes]

34. I think we should all defer to a higher order of knowledge on this subject:

"...as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know."

amen

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

35. I must be a flaming moran because I DO believe in God.

With all my heart and all my (dare I say it?) soul. If there's a problem with that it's theirs, not mine. :shrug:

[AlCzervik]

40. I have 0 problem with people believing or not believing in god just as long as

they don't try and convert me.

I think the problem is extremists on both, i'm an atheist and that's my business and i don't try and convert people to my way of not believing.

[Democrats_win]

37. Attacking Jehovah's Witnesses is like Killing a Mocking Bird. SHAME ON YOU!

Jehovah's Witnesses are not involved politically unlike nearly EVERY other single religion in America.

You CAN tell Witnesses to get off your door step. But with the Baptists, Catholics, Lutherans, and any other false "christians" you cannot tell them to go to f*cking hell because they are whispering in your congress person's ear--they are like the shadow government we've been hearing about.

Jehovah's Witnesses are up front. ALL of the others are scheming bastards.

[Boojatta]

50. Yes, Jehovah's Witnesses are up front, especially if

you initiate contact with them via telephone to ask a question. They tell you up front that they want to change the subject and focus on who is asking. After all, everybody knows that the correct answer to a question depends upon who is asking.

Jehovah's Witnesses unfortunately seem to be a minority everywhere. However, if 99.9% of people in Switzerland were Jehovah's Witnesses, then there would be a critical mass and we would finally see the full flowering of the sect that Charles Taze Russell founded in 1879. Switzerland as a political unit is unfortunately a blood-thirsty military aggressor that maintains an army purely out of obedience to misguided tradition. Were the people of Switzerland who are not Jehovah's Witnesses to experience a low fertility rate for hundreds of years and be replaced by Jehovah's Witnesses, then the Swiss army would gradually dwindle to nothing. Then Switzerland might finally enter the club of peaceful nations.

:sarcasm:

[JerseygirlCT]

56. That's nice.

And your qualifications for deciding who is a "true" Christian are what, exactly? Or for that matter, who the "scheming bastards" are?

I'm not rude to the JW's who appear at my door. At least until that one older woman literally put her foot in my door after I said "no thanks, I'm not interested". Once she literally attempted to invade my home, all bets were off, and the door continued to close - whether her foot was still there or not.

[beam me up scottie]

45. ick

Whatever this was about I'm glad I missed it.

And for the record, most of the DU Atheist Posse don't think that believers are stupid, so don't blame us for whatever the hell this was about.

[TZ]

46. There was a religion war

going on in GD yesterday..Surprised several other threads haven't been moved here...I agree with you.
I have many religious friends, none of home I regard as stupid.

[onager]

51. Not that "Fundamentalist Atheist" crap again?

Besides, "Fundamentalist Atheism" is SO 2006.

I'm upgrading to Fanatical Atheist, myself. Only $5 more per year at the Secret Signup Site, and I also qualify for the Fanatical Atheist MasterCard with 20,000 Bonus Xian Baby-Eating Points.

[Goblinmonger]

52. $5???

Son of a bitch. They charged me $20/year. Do atheists have NO morals?