dunadan

Yeah, the last thing we need here in the U.S. is more physical activity and more cultural understanding.

Personally I think it is terrific that you are doing that, I got involved in a number of cross-cultural classes and extracurricular activities and gained a great deal of respect and appreciation for the human experience. One of the best trends in college programs today is more focus on teaching people more than the 'core' and helping them become broad minded, well rounded people.

You will never have a better chance to learn about other peoples and cultures than when you are in college. Take advantage of it! I would highly recommend a Japanese Green Tea ceremony if you have never seen one and get the opportunity!

Biff the unclean

I'd say that the last thing we need is even more unemployment. Good luck writing your resume

livius drusus

Neither the employment value of one or two of WP's classes nor his tuition payment methods are even remotely germane to this discussion.

livius drusus

I've had all kinds of positive experiences, mainly at work, with Christians ranging from very liberal to Bible study types.

One of the most fascinating was a discussion of the afterlife. It involved a "there must be a god out there" vague Christian, a Bible study/gospel singing Christian, a Bible study/Discovery channel/odd random beliefs mishmash Christian and myself. We covered all kinds of grounds and talked for a good half hour on the subject.

Then a visiting colleague snuck over from the other side of the cube wall and told us in a stage whisper: "You should be careful discussing these kinds of things at work. What if an atheist overheard and made trouble?"

After we all finally managed to stop laughing, I informed him I was an atheist and that I couldn't imagine what grounds I would have for complaint even if I hadn't been an active and riveted participant in the discussion. He mumbled some apropos of nothing cliche about not having a problem with my lifestyle choices even if he didn't agree with them and cleared out of the conversation.

That was a fun day.

Nope. It's quite religious. I think it's perfect here in GRD.

pz

Just to be cynical, I would point out that many christians will be friendly to your face, but you won't know what really lurks in their heart until you threaten to marry their daughter.

I'm not optimistic. There's a lot of hate and hellfire out there, and the only reason it isn't hitting most of us hard is that we are weak and (mostly) quiet, and aren't challenging the overwhelmingly christian bias of the US.

livius drusus

I imagine none of the Christians in my example would have been at all please had I proposed to their daughters. However, I have worked closely with them for 6 years now, and I think if they had secretly harboured contempt for my lack of belief I would have noticed. Subtle they are not.

That may well be true in the larger societal picture, but on a micro level I have found little in the way of hatred and hellfire even here in the deep south. Then again, I'm a city girl. Outside the perimeter is a whole other world.

pz

I don't think it's a matter of subtlety. My mother-in-law is not a devious person, nor is she a particularly fanatical christian, and I dated her daughter for 3 years with nothing but friendliness from her. When we told her we were engaged, though, you could just see her horror at the prospect bubbling up. It was not pretty.

And I don't think it was just my personality...
I'm in a university in a small rural town, and when I've wandered out of my cozy little ivory tower, I've been a bit dismayed. There is deep-rooted, hard and nasty religious bigotry everywhere here. When I've been with community people who don't know my affiliation with the university, they've let slip what they think of us: we are a nest of jews, atheists, communists, liberals, and even a few of those horrible moslems.

There may be plenty of good, open-minded christians out there somewhere, but they aren't the ones with the growing political power, the ones who run the country. It's the crazy christians in charge, and they've got a widespread base of direct support from huge numbers that share their beliefs, and an even wider base of somewhat more rational christians who don't speak out against the lunacy, giving them silent assent, simply because they wear the magic label "christian". I've given up on thinking the Pat Robertsons and the Falwells and the Ashcrofts are anomalies.

Mad Lion

Yes, as a matter of fact I am. It's been an awesome experience. I don't understand your problem with it. It's not like participating in something I enjoy somehow prevents me from taking the rest of my "core" courses. I've gained an understanding of the importance of community, of cultural traditions, made several friends, and of course, had a lot of fun in the process. In fact, as it is also an organization on campus (with elected offices, like a club), I happen to be the vice president. Oh, and I'll be travelling to Ghana next summer with several other members of the group to learn new songs and dances. This is the kind of opportunity that you only really have in college, and I'm going to take advantage of it. I've the rest of my life to be a network technician, or systems administrator; now is the only time in my life where I'll be able to take a month out of my summer to live in Ghana and study traditional west african music and dance.

So, anyway... to get back on topic... I've found that even in the bible belt (where I am), most people don't make a big deal out of religious topics in everyday interaction. I've let several christians where I work know what I think, and as long as I've shown respect for their beliefs, they've at least not made an issue out of it. Most people just want to get along with others and, when you get down to it, most Christians don't take their religion all that seriously anyway, at least not to the point where they would overlook a person's good qualities and treat them badly just because they don't believe in the same god.

However, the overall outlook for the nation as a whole seems quite grim. I think it comes down to the fact that people find it easy to blame atheists for societal problems and to ignore our concerns because they don't realize that they probably KNOW some. It's the same phenomena that allows people to be bigoted towards homosexuals. As soon as they get to know one, their attitudes change oftentimes. People, on the micro level, are generally quite agreeable. On the macro level, people are ignorant and brutish. Perhaps it's because it's hard to feel a sense of community with an entire nation, especially with people whom you may "perceive" to be vastly different from you. However, the atheist next door is a decent guy, so you say high to him or whatever, without realizing that he's the same person as the atheist that you're ranting at for protesting prayer in school, or whatever.

God, that was rambling and incoherent, heh.

Hedwig

The positive side is, as mainstream people find themselves interacting with atheists and discovering that they are every bit as moral as your average theist citizen (sometimes more), they find it more difficult to hang on to the stereotype of them being evil. Same thing that happens when homophobic people finally meet someone who's actually gay. I'm actually quite friendly with one of our campus uber-fundie ministers who protests the gay pride parade every year. We get along great when he's not on his pulpit and he's a very smart man. Yet he knows who I am and still chooses to talk to me. It's much harder to hate an individual person. It's much easier to hate an anonymous group.

Sorry for the tangent, folks. My brain is set on shuffle today.

BTW, WastedPotential...I think that sounds like an awesome class and I envy your chance to travel.