Bill Snedden

I don't see what this has to do with the issue at hand. Your claim was that "atheists" were making oppressive statements and taking action against theists now. Your statement doesn't address my argument: the great majority of the non-religious, including atheists, do not hate the religious, wish them harm or want to see them persecuted or eradicated. To take the statements of a vociferous few and extend them by necessity to the majority is fallacious reasoning.

Unfortunately, SI issues from before 1995 are not available on-line and I don't have access to issues before 1991 at my library. I have read the last five articles authored by Dr. Dawkins in my personal copies of the last year and a half and he never advocates what you suggest.

I suggest that you might have misread or misconstrued something in those articles, but quotes certainly would clear it up.

I'm not attempting any sort of tu quoque. I'm merely pointing out that such hostility is not limited to anti-theists. It doesn't make one side better than the other. On the contrary, it's just wrong, regardles of who does it.

Not quite. You'll notice that on this thread alone, others have voiced similar opinions. Given my personal experience here and in the RW, I'd be willing to bet real money that the majority of freethinkers feel exactly the same way.

Fundamentalists seem to define any Christian whose beliefs differ from their own as "atheists". Sort of like calling the Bible a science text.

The label "scholarly" is appended to research and journals based on the manner in which they are conducted or edited, the way in which findings are evaluated in order to reach conclusions, and the rigor with which articles are tested before publication, among other things. Using this understanding, JS publications most certainly are scholarly.

Great, a majority of one!

Point being?

I have no idea. It certainly wasn't my intention to do so.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

FarSeeker

Actually, if your a kindergarten teacher in California, you will be soon (from what I hear).

But then let us not forget the Atheist who walked into a church in the U.S. a few years ago and started shooting Christians.

But why should you care?

Orestes

Then let us not forget the Christians a few years ago who beat a homosexual to death in Wyoming. And let us not forget the Christians in Bosnia who butchered the Muslim residents. And let us not forget the fighting between Catholics and Protestants in N. Ireland. And let us not forget the children who die because their Christian parents think medicine is of the Devil. And...

brighid

And let's not forget Andrea Yates and her dead children, Or the Klu Klux Klan, or the Army of God, or the Christian Reconstructionist Movement, or any of the other Christian Hate groups, or the Crusades, the Inquisitions, Salem Witch Trials, ... oh but why should YOU care? I bet they aren't TRUE CHRISTIANS? So, why is it when Christians kill in the name of their God Christians don't hate all other Christians, but when any non-Christian does anything similar it's suddenly the "evil" atheist and then prejudicially lumps all non-believers as such?? Hmmmmm... hypocritical don't ya think?

B

Edited to add ... here's something for you to hate your faith over:

During the past week, many have called Donald W. Matthews a peaceful man. Matthews, 61, of Jackson Township, believed in God and country. He quoted Bible scripture and sections of the U.S. Constitution.

But on Aug. 9, Matthews grabbed a gun he carried with him and started shooting at police officers.

Police say he killed Massillon police officer Eric Taylor before Taylor ever drew his weapon. Three other Massillon officers and an Ohio Highway Patrol trooper returned fire and killed Matthews.

Why have a shootout with police?

Matthews apparently believed Trooper Joseph Hershey was violating the Constitution by stopping him on Route 21 for driving too fast.

[ August 21, 2002: Message edited by: brighid ]</p>

Ab_Normal

FarSeeker:
Can you provide a link to a source?

lpetrich

Seems to me like some Fundie urban legend.

Radcliffe Emerson

Hindus might or might not be theistic, but I think saying "they're ready to swallow anything about religion" is a bit much. I give Hindus more credit than Christians. To me Christians (and Muslims to an extent) are the ones who swallow everything they're told, unless of course it's from another religion's point of view.
I think Hindus and Sikhs, Buddhists are probably more open to discussing other viewpoints.

Bree

So, in other words: atheism needs a "thrilling myth" in order to contain any amount of truth? If we had a "thrilling" myth of origin (I say "myth" and mean something which is a good story but contains no truth) then it would somehow validate atheism? Please explain.

Looks like you haven't read the Bible.

<a href="http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/lev/19.html#20" target="_blank">Rape of a slave woman is to be punished by scourging the victim (the slave woman) -- but the rapist's sins "shall be forgiven him." </a>

<a href="http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/ex/31.html#14" target="_blank">Those who break the Sabbath are to be executed.</a>

<a href="http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/1kg/22.html#43" target="_blank">Jehoshaphat "did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord" and "took" the homosexuals (sodomites) "out of the land," or as the RSV says, "he exterminated" them.</a>

Please, no "you're interpreting these passages incorrectly" or "these were translated incorrectly" BS. This is your Bible. This is black-and-white, plain English. This is what your religion has deemed "the sword by which all must live." If you can't handle it, get out. Excuses are just that.

Bree

If you're going to go around belittling people for their own "lack of belief" then you'd sure as hell better be secure in your own. I don't like pot-kettle-black, myself.

Starboy

Atheism != -theism

Atheism = 0 * theism

Starboy