Nicely noted on the other points, but I didn't hear her say anything about her comment being dumb...

>> ^GenjiKilpatrick:
@Lawdeedaw
I know you have your own opinion but i'm sure you can see mine:
This kid sincerely believes this shit. That dumb girl knew what she was saying was dumb.
She even says so in the goddamned video, so if we can consider that a moot point.. awesome.
~~
The gist of the comment was - "why do we have to keep having discussions about dumb religious people?! because it adds nothing to the community. ..which is the opposite of the intended goal of said community.. i think"
The difference between the sincerely religious and criminals being: Criminals show remorse! (at least after they get caught, sometimes.. if they're not utterly abnormal..)
All your "objective facts","empirical data" and "hindsight" has no ill effects on the esteem of two groups of homo sapiens.
Bureaucrats & Zealots.
Hence.. why clog up queues and inboxes with a sad unfunny and pointless video displaying a present reality we have absolutely no power to change?
[cause raising your kids well doesn't do fuckall for the hundreds of millions of kids that got born to the dumb families in the most uninformed/unaware communities]
iunno, my .4 percent of a nickle about it

@Lawdeedaw
I know you have your own opinion but i'm sure you can see mine:

This kid sincerely believes this shit. That dumb girl knew what she was saying was dumb.

She even says so in the goddamned video, so if we can consider that a moot point.. awesome.
~~

The gist of the comment was - "why do we have to keep having discussions about dumb religious people?! because it adds nothing to the community. ..which is the opposite of the intended goal of said community.. i think"

The difference between the sincerely religious and criminals being: Criminals show remorse! (at least after they get caught, sometimes.. if they're not utterly abnormal..)

All your "objective facts","empirical data" and "hindsight" has no ill effects on the esteem of two groups of homo sapiens.

Bureaucrats & Zealots.

Hence.. why clog up queues and inboxes with a sad unfunny and pointless video displaying a present reality we have absolutely no power to change?

[cause raising your kids well doesn't do fuckall for the hundreds of millions of kids that got born to the dumb families in the most uninformed/unaware communities]

iunno, my .4 percent of a nickle about it

The metaphor of an endangered species of duck is still apt.


No. It is not an apt comparison, you should stop using it, thinking in these brackets and stop listening to whomever told you this crap:


1. Human beings are at the top of the food chain, intelligent, social and able to make babies with one another, as previously stated.

2. Ducks can be saved by humans because humans can save ducks because: point 1. Ducks cannot form eco-departments of duck governments to save other ducks. Because they are fucking ducks. Certain species of ducks cannot breed with other species of ducks. Because they are actually different in more ways than colour. So saving a certain species of duck makes sense for biodiversity and etc. Also, plants and whatnot.

3. Now: Human beings of whatever colour, culture or other dividing feature your racist brain cooks up, are NOT DUCKS. They are all equally human. All. Equally. Let it sink in. Aaaalll. Eeeequaally. Not one single person is above another.

The above considered, I plead that because a particular civilization finds itself below replacement level it is in a perilous state and merits attention. This is a conclusion that, again, assumes an overreaching, unfettered respect for diversity.


There it is again, the racism. See point 3 for physical racism. Now to your cultural racism: "Civilisations," cultures, religions are NOT DUCKS. They are collective constructs. They diminish, they go inert. You can look at them in museums. Because there are almost always remnants and relics. But cultures are never dead. They are not murdered, driven away by evil muslims, outbred or dying off.

Cultures go on in the following cultures. They are absorbed. They are mixed. They are in flux. As I mentioned before. Cultures change. It is inevitable. A few hundred years ago, German was spoken on the British isles. It mingled with Scandinavian, Celtic and french languages and cultures --> English.

You must extend your own desire to protect a unique given species to the right of a nation to maintain its own identifying characteristics. Realize that the desire for prosperity and sustained existence of a nation does not by definition mandate the impingement on another.

Bullshit. Any nation's "identifying characteristics" did not exist 200 years ago and will not exist in 200 years time. It doesn't even need an outside influence to do it. It happens. "Nations" do not have a right to maintain characteristics. Those which tried, failed. We live in a globally connected world now in which ideas, culture, science and knowledge can be shared freely. Look at yourself being lectured at by a post-racial, post-fascist human being on the internet. Whatever culture you belong to, it changed a lot and it will keep changing a lot. This is called progress. Otherwise we'd all be talking a babylonian language.


On the other hand, if like GenjiKilpatrick you harbour a sense that "whites" deserve to be eradicated because of who they are... you're barely human.

As far as I can see here, he never said such a thing. This is your irrational fearful racist mind at work. Try to look outside your head. I guess you misread this: Not to mention - Adult White Males have been the most privileged, self-entitled, killin' & manipulating "lesser" cultures type homo sapiens on the planet for a few centuries now, at least.
He says that white men were basically "in charge." Nowhere does he call for an eradication.

And again you are calling a fiction of your own "barely human". I do not think it, Genji does not think it. This is your racist mind creating fictions you can lash out at. Try to see how your own fears are all without merit. Group B will not destroy anyone's culture. They will enhance it. As they have done before. And Group A will enhance them. As they have done before. In fact, there are no group A or B. Just humans with interchanging, intermingling cultures. Stop thinking in black and white. In every aspect.

@Pprt

Just like Islam or Judaism isn't race. Neither is being a ginger.

Not to mention - Adult White Males have been the most privileged, self-entitled, killin' & manipulating "lesser" cultures type homo sapiens on the planet for a few centuries now, at least.

So what the hell are you talking about "civilizations going extinct"?

I pretty sure that dude used a frickin' computer to mock up this crazy ass diatribe, took an electric tram to the scene and used his iphone to call his nutbag friends before he went thru with it.

You should take an anthropology course before you go poppin' off at the mouth like that.

>> ^Ryjkyj:

I'm still working on my first one. It's been 27 years.


Don't feel bad, so has Abe Sapien. He has only completed two sides as well.

>> ^dag:

For aliens, I can imagine love would be getting close to mathematical perfection - a near perfect sphere, a beautifully balanced equation, a well-thought-out proof.


... a perfectly prepared Homo-Sapien Hypothalmus, seared in a lemon sauce with Fava Beans and a nice Chianti.

Sure it's E. Even the Russian "DJ" says "Lo and behold, the consequence of imbibing Methylendioxymethamphetamine in homo sapiens sapiens" at ~1:05.

@Gallowflak

What you're describing does not pertain to the debate of religion vs. atheism per se, but of human psychology, social hierarchy, etc. Of course there will always be dumb people that need to be spoon-fed what to think. The question is, will they function better with religious ideas or atheistic ideas? For now, since atheism is frowned upon by the majority, atheists will indeed represent more of brightest members of society, those that can think for themselves and that can stand up for their convictions. The same can be said of original prophets and their first followers, who decide to go against the flow of society in order to gain what they perceived as an advantage: they invent a new religion and stand up for their beliefs. The difference, again, is in the aims and consequences of religion vs. atheism. Religion restricts your thinking to a subset of the "world" with added "unworldly" dependencies like god that enforce the limited "world", whereas atheism expands thinking to the "world" with nothing more or less added/subtracted. I think atheism is thus a better suited worldview for everyone and is especially liberating to those in-between the brightest and dumbest, the "middle class" of intelligence, those that can think for themselves but may fear the risks associated with it in a religious society or do not know where to start or how to think correctly/productively (avoiding fallacies, etc.). You may think, like Voltaire, that this is only a matter of tolerance. Maybe it is, but again I would argue that tolerance is a value easier to maintain in an atheistic environment than in a religious one (mostly because atheism, being neutral, does not fix a priori what the boundaries of the "world" are since it has no arbitrary dependencies, except maybe for human experience itself; but that is something we cannot do anything about as long as we do not evolve into something more than homo sapiens, whether through natural selection or technology).

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Blankfist butter makes the best salve - it's a frictionless transaction.

(I kid @blankfist- he's the Libertarian man)



In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
Gosh dag, that might be the most disturbing thing you've ever said to me. I mean I'm supposed to be the pervert around here, not you. Just because I've been slacking on my lecherous duties lately doesn't give you any right.
Let us never speak of this again.

In reply to this comment by dag:
I know it's self-indulgent masturbation but I'm trying to cut down on real masturbation - and this is a salve.

In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
Look at blankfist and you debating political philosophy. It warms my heart. Makes me proud to be a homo sapien. Still, I hope you aren't debating him on the clock. When productivity suffers, you make the Invisible Hand cry.

Gosh dag, that might be the most disturbing thing you've ever said to me. I mean I'm supposed to be the pervert around here, not you. Just because I've been slacking on my lecherous duties lately doesn't give you any right.
Let us never speak of this again.

In reply to this comment by dag:
I know it's self-indulgent masturbation but I'm trying to cut down on real masturbation - and this is a salve.

In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
Look at blankfist and you debating political philosophy. It warms my heart. Makes me proud to be a homo sapien. Still, I hope you aren't debating him on the clock. When productivity suffers, you make the Invisible Hand cry.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

I know it's self-indulgent masturbation but I'm trying to cut down on real masturbation - and this is a salve.

In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
Look at blankfist and you debating political philosophy. It warms my heart. Makes me proud to be a homo sapien. Still, I hope you aren't debating him on the clock. When productivity suffers, you make the Invisible Hand cry.

Look at blankfist and you debating political philosophy. It warms my heart. Makes me proud to be a homo sapien. Still, I hope you aren't debating him on the clock. When productivity suffers, you make the Invisible Hand cry.

>> ^quantumushroom:
Other than that bastard homo sapiens, no creature is ever really "caught" doing anything. All but one of God's creatures even knows of the existence of right and wrong.


Bah! That bastard platypuss beat us again!

DAMN YOU PLATYPUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSS!

Other than that bastard homo sapiens, no creature is ever really "caught" doing anything. All but one of God's creatures even knows of the existence of right and wrong.

@SDGundamX

I hope I've done the tag properly. I prefer notifications to be set to 'off' because I get enough junkmail from the other bazillion websites I'm registered to as it is, so yeah I don't pay much attention to that stuff.

Anyway, on to your reply!

Speaking of assumptions...

Oh boy! Here we go!

...I’m noticing that you tend to make a lot of them. You assumed, for instance, that I was a Christian. You assumed that I was trying to defend a particular religion or religious practice.

Yes, I did, as I've already admitted. It was a fine display of all the common symptoms of a religious apologist/troll, touting all the usual old and tired canards I've heard repeated ad nauseum; unjustified and arrogantly pronounced assertions with no evidence to ground them to reality, a blatant false equivocation, and flat out wrong characterizations of Hitchens et al's position. I'm genuinely sorry I had you falsely pegged but when it walks like a duck and squawks like a duck...well, y'know. In other words, you probably could have done a better job of elucidating and then justifying your opinion.

You assumed (and continue to assume) that I am calling Hitchens and the rest fundamentalists. I am not. I could not. Atheism by its very definition cannot be “fundamentalist” as this article explains. What I said was:

I find it ironic that those such as Hitchens, Dawkins, and Harris, in their zeal to exterminate religion, have become such zealots unwilling to admit evidence contrary to their position that they now rival the fundamentalists they profess to be fighting against.

Your words are right there above mine. They are zealots that rival the fundamentalists they are opposed to, in their zeal to exterminate (I call bullshit on this, they seek to marginalize it not destroy it) religion. On what planet is this not a false equivocation? On what planet am I to not take you at your word? You still haven't provided evidence for this or the other claim that they even wish to exterminate religion, as well. Because they don't. If you don't stand by your wording then retract it. You really haven't read anything from them other than what you have learned from secondary, tertiary sources, have you?



...that they refuse to revise their absolutist statements about religion being the cause of evil or the spreading hatred even when faced with evidence of religion instead bringing good into the world (on the blog—the story of Hitchens and the taxi driver who went to great lengths to return Hitchens’ lost wallet because the driver’s religion demanded he do so).

This evidence exists in heaps and bounds—I would guess (though I don’t know for sure, granted) in equal amounts to the evidence that religion spreads hatred. Regardless of the amount, in the face of the fact that such evidence exists at all, Hitchens’ previous statement (the one made in this clip about religion being the primary cause of hatred) becomes wholly untenable.


Are you seriously attributing the fact that moral people can exist within the institution of a religion and still be moral, to the religion itself? Could you name a single decent thing a religious person can do that a non-religious person couldn't? What kind of morality do you think preceded the origins of the Muslim cab driver's religion? The exact same morality that has always existed between humans and other humans on some level, that of mutual altruistic behavior, the "golden rule" and that the Abrahamic religion has co-opted into the rest of their vile ideology. You have your causes and effects here reversed, human morality is what it is in spite of religion, and to invoke religion where its not even a necessary requirement is to trivialize the very thing that enabled homo sapiens, as inherently social animals, to get to where we are today in this technological age without destroying ourselves in the process.


In regards to the so-called ad hom: I feel this applies to your post because you appear to be dismissing my argument before even considering it since you start off suspecting I don’t think clearly.

Well, you are wrong. I obviously read your whole reply before I responded. What you feel is irrelevant. Did you just read that one line and then ignore everything else I said? I mentioned the "not thinking clearly thing" purely as an aside, I then went on to address your points. Ad hom doesn't apply, sorry. It would've if that was all I supplied as the basis of my argument; I didn't say "You do not think clearly, therefore you are wrong". Ad hominem isn't what you wish it to be so stop abusing the term.

This brings us back to the Gnu Atheist’s confrontational tactics—in that link you gave me, the writer explicitly endorses being rude. I’m not here to tell you it isn’t a valid tactic—it most certainly is.


Being unflinchingly truthful and not kowtowing to the religious lies/claptrap and ridiculing those whose faith is threatened (who would have no qualms about being as rude and demeaning as possible in telling me so) by my sole existence is rude now. You should tell those uppity gays to be more polite and not stand up for equal treatment, in whatever way they choose as long as its non-violent/within the boundaries of the law, maybe their oppressors would stand down. No, confrontation is the answer if you want to change speak out and "business as usual". I consider lies to be harmful and rude and demeaning to an individual deserving of being treated like an adult in the marketplace of ideas, even the most comfortably benign, fluffy touchie-feelie ones.


I’m here to question it’s efficacy.

It was already pretty clear to me but thanks. It looked to me like you had already decided. You may NOW be appearing to question that, but again, what you may have meant certainly isn't what you wrote and to expect others to be able to know is dickish. I agree it's a good question still but haven't provided evidence to show its efficacy. So let's refrain from the assumptions. All I know is it wasn't some accommodationist, overly polite wank, unwilling to get his hands dirty to enlighten me, that stirred the feelings I've secretly held for so many years about my existence and God, it was someone who was NOT afraid of confrontation in surgically disillusioning my cherished notions of reality, of showing just how ridiculously absurd the whole thing is. It is a matter of ethics to value truth more than(key words) some default arbitrarily designated level of respect.

So, what I was trying to say in my original post is that it annoys me that Hitchens and the rest continue onward with their blanket absolutist statements despite the fact that there exists evidence to the contrary.

Saying religion, of all kinds, is the primary (meaning secondary and tertiary factors also contribute but don't even approach the monopoly religion has on spreading misery, violence, and hatred) isn't really a controversial statement at all to me. History tells us much. Can you think of any other more divisive human social construct that has caused more strife throughout history? Shall we play the game of "add up the bodies"? It boggles the mind to think of where humanity might be right now if not for the Dark Ages.

For instance, just because some people use communism to establish totalitarian regimes, doesn’t make communism evil.

Communism is as much an ideology based on fantasy as religion. In so far as it is not based on evidence and reason and being willfully enforced/propagated, it is harmful.

So, my question for you is, is being rude and disrespectful to people an effective arguing technique? Let’s be clear, I am not saying we need to respect other people’s ideas.


It certainly can be effective. I have no real evidence besides anecdotes and the correlative fact that religious membership levels in the US/Britain have been slowly declining since around the time the Gnu Atheists began to speak out and be more prominently featured in the media/Internets in general. The level of ridicule should be in proportion to the level of bat-shit insanity of the beliefs held. No one is championing a one-size-fits-all approach.

To tie all this together, let’s talk about one last assumption you made. You assumed I didn’t want to reply to your questions because I was trying to dodge the issue. I’d like us to be clear on my true reasons for not replying (so you won’t have to assume anymore).

I (like you, I imagine) happen to be a very busy person. I work full-time and put in a lot of unpaid overtime. I also have a beautiful family and good friends that I want to spend my free time with. This limits the amount of time I can spend on the Internet. So I have to choose when and how to respond to posts wisely.

Fair enough, I wouldn't accuse someone of dodging for being busy. I do not expect replies either, I hold you to nothing except your own words. I accused you of dodging because, when asked, you didn't provide much in the way of evidence to justify your assertions or a flat-out retraction. I could say this in any number of polite ways, you simply didn't.

You, from the very start of your post, set out to pick a fight.

Guilty as charged!

You made completely unfounded assumptions and then attacked an imaginary opponent that you mistook for me.

I made the assumption you were religious and was wrong, the rest still stands. You don't want others to take your word for it? Then add some more words! What you may have "meant" is not what I got pissed off at and responded to, understand this already.

Why should I spend it defending or searching the Internet for proof for an argument I never actually made (the “reality/validity” of Christianity; the fundamentalism of atheists like Hitchens)? Why should I try to reason with someone who from the very outset displays such misguided behavior?

That's my whole point! You shouldn't have said anything at all if you didn't have anything truthful to say in the first place. You really have no fucking clue what you're talking about when you talk about them and you rightly got called on it. I already addressed where I made any assumptions about you, the rest is through your own doing. You have NOT shown that they rival those fundamentalists they oppose, you have NOT shown that they wish to eradicate religion, you haven't even shown how they are zealots. You are being incredibly dishonest to the point of absurdity!


Thanks for reading this to the end. As a footnote, here is a link to a discussion on that web site you gave me that I found very interesting. Most of all, I found JoiletJake’s comments interesting—see posts #139 and #146 in particular, as I believe they are similar to my views on religion.


I've already read them and just re-read. Joilet comes off as incredibly honest, humble considering his position, and its pretty plain to see that the response he got, while initially bumpy, gradually warmed up to him as he elaborated and made it well known he is relying solely on his personal feeling in the matter and not trying to assert an attribution of those feelings onto actual reality. I think its great your attitude aligns with his, it may not be logically consistent but at least it's pretty harmless on the whole. Notice he wasn't tossing out baseless assertions, straw manning, or falsely equivocating.

I'd really enjoy it if you were to paste/copy what you said on Pharyngula and see how different the reaction would be. Such tasty schadenfreude! My guess is you would be entertainingly dismantled, rudely perhaps, but dismantled nonetheless. Welcome to the Internets.

I really have no interest in continuing this conversation, as lovely and downright tedious as it has been. I am done responding the minutiae of your several attempts at special pleading. Think whatever you want about the Gnu Atheists, whatever keeps the cognitive dissonance at bay.