Anonymous wrote:Who said they want to change minds?
There was a long, long thread entitled "Why do atheists post on the religion forum" where at least one and maybe multiple posters claimed they were trying to change my own personal mind.
When was this?
Is that poster even still active? Lots of assumptions there…
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Exactly.
So frustrating. Atheists don't need to justify their beliefs (or lack of), but yet people beat down that we must prove everything to people who refuse to do anything on their own. Such garbage that pp is trying to deny actual lived experiences - IRL and on this forum.
I'm not denying anyone's lived experience. I'm saying that if you look at the actual threads created on this forum, it's blowing it out of proportion to say that most or even a bunch of them are created expressly to attack atheists. It's happening, as was the case with the religious freedom thread, but just not that often. Just like it happens that threads are created to attack Christians, again, not that often. Maybe it FEELS like it happens more because of the emotional impact it has on the PP, but it's objectively not a frequent occurrence. I said at one point yesterday that a stronger argument could be made for threads devolving into atheist bashing and I would fully agree with that argument, but an argument that people here START threads regularly to bash atheists is just not born out by the last 6 pages of threads that I went through, nor by my recollection of frequenting this forum over the past 4 years.
FWIW, I'm not asking atheist PP to justify their atheism at all. Go ahead and believe or not believe whatever you want, as long as you're a good person.
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Exactly.
So frustrating. Atheists don't need to justify their beliefs (or lack of), but yet people beat down that we must prove everything to people who refuse to do anything on their own. Such garbage that pp is trying to deny actual lived experiences - IRL and on this forum.
I'm not denying anyone's lived experience. I'm saying that if you look at the actual threads created on this forum, it's blowing it out of proportion to say that most or even a bunch of them are created expressly to attack atheists. It's happening, as was the case with the religious freedom thread, but just not that often. Just like it happens that threads are created to attack Christians, again, not that often. Maybe it FEELS like it happens more because of the emotional impact it has on the PP, but it's objectively not a frequent occurrence. I said at one point yesterday that a stronger argument could be made for threads devolving into atheist bashing and I would fully agree with that argument, but an argument that people here START threads regularly to bash atheists is just not born out by the last 6 pages of threads that I went through, nor by my recollection of frequenting this forum over the past 4 years.
FWIW, I'm not asking atheist PP to justify their atheism at all. Go ahead and believe or not believe whatever you want, as long as you're a good person.
Again, you are not capable of having an actual coversation without twisting words to try and suit your narrative. The post you replied to about believers starting threads to disparage atheists did not say "most" threads or even "a bunch". I will copy and paste it for you, since you seem severely lacking in reading comprehension.
"Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc."
This 100% happens. Stop trying to twist words that are written clearly, in black and white. You are incorrect, and it's not worth talking to someone so disingenuous as to deny actual facts stated about this forum and posts.
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Exactly.
So frustrating. Atheists don't need to justify their beliefs (or lack of), but yet people beat down that we must prove everything to people who refuse to do anything on their own. Such garbage that pp is trying to deny actual lived experiences - IRL and on this forum.
I'm not denying anyone's lived experience. I'm saying that if you look at the actual threads created on this forum, it's blowing it out of proportion to say that most or even a bunch of them are created expressly to attack atheists. It's happening, as was the case with the religious freedom thread, but just not that often. Just like it happens that threads are created to attack Christians, again, not that often. Maybe it FEELS like it happens more because of the emotional impact it has on the PP, but it's objectively not a frequent occurrence. I said at one point yesterday that a stronger argument could be made for threads devolving into atheist bashing and I would fully agree with that argument, but an argument that people here START threads regularly to bash atheists is just not born out by the last 6 pages of threads that I went through, nor by my recollection of frequenting this forum over the past 4 years.
FWIW, I'm not asking atheist PP to justify their atheism at all. Go ahead and believe or not believe whatever you want, as long as you're a good person.
Literally no one said that. Strawman.
There is regular atheist bashing on this forum. It’s interesting that you’ve are so invested in disputing that.
Anonymous wrote:"Human rights created by social contract are useless. If we create them by majority vote, we can remove them by majority vote - then how can they protect minorities? Unless human rights are THERE - objectively, apart from human decision or cultural creation - they can't do their job." - Tim Keller
I hope he's not trying to say that the Bible is the originator of human rights.
It would be like saying the Bible is the originator of kindness, or any other positive human attribute.
He’s saying humans aren’t the originators of human rights.
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Exactly.
So frustrating. Atheists don't need to justify their beliefs (or lack of), but yet people beat down that we must prove everything to people who refuse to do anything on their own. Such garbage that pp is trying to deny actual lived experiences - IRL and on this forum.
I'm not denying anyone's lived experience. I'm saying that if you look at the actual threads created on this forum, it's blowing it out of proportion to say that most or even a bunch of them are created expressly to attack atheists. It's happening, as was the case with the religious freedom thread, but just not that often. Just like it happens that threads are created to attack Christians, again, not that often. Maybe it FEELS like it happens more because of the emotional impact it has on the PP, but it's objectively not a frequent occurrence. I said at one point yesterday that a stronger argument could be made for threads devolving into atheist bashing and I would fully agree with that argument, but an argument that people here START threads regularly to bash atheists is just not born out by the last 6 pages of threads that I went through, nor by my recollection of frequenting this forum over the past 4 years.
FWIW, I'm not asking atheist PP to justify their atheism at all. Go ahead and believe or not believe whatever you want, as long as you're a good person.
OK, so you agree atheists are regularly bashed here, just not that many threads are created specifically to bash them, but some are?
This is a critically important distinction and I personally thank you for your insight which obviously changes everything.
Anonymous wrote:"Human rights created by social contract are useless. If we create them by majority vote, we can remove them by majority vote - then how can they protect minorities? Unless human rights are THERE - objectively, apart from human decision or cultural creation - they can't do their job." - Tim Keller
I hope he's not trying to say that the Bible is the originator of human rights.
It would be like saying the Bible is the originator of kindness, or any other positive human attribute.
He’s saying humans aren’t the originators of human rights.
Which is wrong…
But yet also stated in the Declaration of Independence...
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Exactly.
So frustrating. Atheists don't need to justify their beliefs (or lack of), but yet people beat down that we must prove everything to people who refuse to do anything on their own. Such garbage that pp is trying to deny actual lived experiences - IRL and on this forum.
I'm not denying anyone's lived experience. I'm saying that if you look at the actual threads created on this forum, it's blowing it out of proportion to say that most or even a bunch of them are created expressly to attack atheists. It's happening, as was the case with the religious freedom thread, but just not that often. Just like it happens that threads are created to attack Christians, again, not that often. Maybe it FEELS like it happens more because of the emotional impact it has on the PP, but it's objectively not a frequent occurrence. I said at one point yesterday that a stronger argument could be made for threads devolving into atheist bashing and I would fully agree with that argument, but an argument that people here START threads regularly to bash atheists is just not born out by the last 6 pages of threads that I went through, nor by my recollection of frequenting this forum over the past 4 years.
FWIW, I'm not asking atheist PP to justify their atheism at all. Go ahead and believe or not believe whatever you want, as long as you're a good person.
OK, so you agree atheists are regularly bashed here, just not that many threads are created specifically to bash them, but some are?
This is a critically important distinction and I personally thank you for your insight which obviously changes everything.
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Yes, and I admitted that I missed it and apologized. I also "did my homework" and went back 6 pages to look for more examples. I didn't find any. If there are more that I missed, please share your receipts. If not, just admit that people creating threads to bash atheists isn't a rampant problem and move on. Harping on this without backing up your claim isn't going to help change anyone's mind about the mean, bad Christians. It's just going to make you look paranoid.
DP and it is interesting to me that some atheists (maybe not PP) come on here claiming they intend to change minds - see the thread title! - but then are so grouchy when asked for data or reasoning to back up their claims. Note: I did not say all (some present really interesting arguments!). Note 2: I did not say PP who refuses to "do your homework" is one who intends to change any minds.
FWIW to those who do intend to change minds, what these attitudes certainly won't do is change hearts, and we all find ways to justify believing in what we love.
And you love the idea of fitting in to the society as it is and love the idea of living forever in heaven with God even hough it doesn't make any sense at all.
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Yes, and I admitted that I missed it and apologized. I also "did my homework" and went back 6 pages to look for more examples. I didn't find any. If there are more that I missed, please share your receipts. If not, just admit that people creating threads to bash atheists isn't a rampant problem and move on. Harping on this without backing up your claim isn't going to help change anyone's mind about the mean, bad Christians. It's just going to make you look paranoid.
DP and it is interesting to me that some atheists (maybe not PP) come on here claiming they intend to change minds - see the thread title! - but then are so grouchy when asked for data or reasoning to back up their claims. Note: I did not say all (some present really interesting arguments!). Note 2: I did not say PP who refuses to "do your homework" is one who intends to change any minds.
FWIW to those who do intend to change minds, what these attitudes certainly won't do is change hearts, and we all find ways to justify believing in what we love.
And you love the idea of fitting in to the society as it is and love the idea of living forever in heaven with God even though it doesn't make any sense at all.
Anonymous wrote:"Human rights created by social contract are useless. If we create them by majority vote, we can remove them by majority vote - then how can they protect minorities? Unless human rights are THERE - objectively, apart from human decision or cultural creation - they can't do their job." - Tim Keller
I hope he's not trying to say that the Bible is the originator of human rights.
It would be like saying the Bible is the originator of kindness, or any other positive human attribute.
He’s saying humans aren’t the originators of human rights.
Which is wrong…
But yet also stated in the Declaration of Independence...
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Exactly.
So frustrating. Atheists don't need to justify their beliefs (or lack of), but yet people beat down that we must prove everything to people who refuse to do anything on their own. Such garbage that pp is trying to deny actual lived experiences - IRL and on this forum.
I'm not denying anyone's lived experience. I'm saying that if you look at the actual threads created on this forum, it's blowing it out of proportion to say that most or even a bunch of them are created expressly to attack atheists. It's happening, as was the case with the religious freedom thread, but just not that often. Just like it happens that threads are created to attack Christians, again, not that often. Maybe it FEELS like it happens more because of the emotional impact it has on the PP, but it's objectively not a frequent occurrence. I said at one point yesterday that a stronger argument could be made for threads devolving into atheist bashing and I would fully agree with that argument, but an argument that people here START threads regularly to bash atheists is just not born out by the last 6 pages of threads that I went through, nor by my recollection of frequenting this forum over the past 4 years.
FWIW, I'm not asking atheist PP to justify their atheism at all. Go ahead and believe or not believe whatever you want, as long as you're a good person.
OK, so you agree atheists are regularly bashed here, just not that many threads are created specifically to bash them, but some are?
This is a critically important distinction and I personally thank you for your insight which obviously changes everything.
Anonymous wrote:The atheists who post here are usually far more close minded and tedious than the atheists I know in real life. They engage in patronizing, gross oversimplifications and reductive thinking that actually puts me off atheism. I remain open to agnosticism since we can’t prove metaphysical beliefs one way or the other.
You've expressed your opinion, and now I'll express mine: I don't care if your characterization of anything anyone says here "puts you off atheism". I hope no one is religious or non-religious because they were "put off" by someone. I think being put off by someone is a terrible reason for believing or not believing.
We know a tree by the fruits it bears.
I pay a lot of attention to character. Not a religious literalist and don’t resonate with dogmatism in either religion or atheism.
There's no dogmatism in atheism because there's no dogma. It's simply lack of belief in theism (any religion).
.
Many of the atheists who post here are extremely dogmatic, patronizing and unnecessarily antagonistic.
If you are a religious person who is sure you are right, despite total lack of evidence and lots of faith, then simply ignore anyone who doesn't see things your way.
I have good friends and family members IRL who are atheists. We have wonderful relationships based on mutual respect.
Many atheists who post in this forum are extremely patronizing and disrespectful with a disdain for nuance.
How would you describe the "believers" who post often on this forum?
One glaring difference I have noticed is that a majority of religious posters speak only for themselves and their path to religion while many atheist posters appear to speak for not only for themselves, but for all of atheism and the many different kinds of religious beliefs and experiences. Further religion as a whole is conflated with evangelism and biblical literalists.
This could be just a few obsessed atheists doing other atheists a disservice though.
I was asking about “believers”.
How would you describe the tone of their posts?
As reflected in the observation that they usually just speak for themselves or their specific faith tradition, they have diverse tones. I am not comfortable with biblical literalism, proselytization or evangelism and don’t resonate with dogmatic takes from either religious people or atheists. I just see less less overarching dogma from the religious posters in this forum.
Dogma can be both secular and religious. The Latin word dogma means “philosophical tenet” derived from Ancient Greek (dógma, “opinion, tenet”).
I was curious if you were going to provide an objective observation. Guess not. You can't seem to respond without finding a way to trash atheists.
There are bible literalists pushing dogma. There absolutely is overarching dogma re: Christianity. And there are disrespectful believers with not an ounce of nuance.
It's still acceptable, in US culture, to trash atheists. It's also expected to be outwardly accepting of other religions, with the assumption that everyone has SOME religion, and only the non-religious atheist types are bad guys. That will change eventually. It already has thru much of Europe.
Huh? I'm from the DMV. It's not been a thing here as long as I've lived here for it to be acceptable to trash atheists. Maybe in other parts of the country, but not here. I'm deeply religious, but I've known many thoughtful and intelligent atheists who have challenged me and been great friends to me since high school.
Certainly some religious people on DCUM think it's acceptable. DP.
Pretty sure they are responding more to the downright meanspirited and insulting attitude displayed by individual posts than judging a group in the abstract.
Guess you haven’t been here long. Some “believers” on here can get pretty nasty. Starting threads to disparage atheists, etc.
When is the last time there was a thread on here started to disparage atheists? On the first page of the forum right now, there are only two threads about atheists and both were started by atheists to discuss being atheist (the one about talking to little kids and the one about how you became atheist). I'm sure there are some rude comments from "believers" in the talking to little kids thread, but it's long and I didn't follow the whole thing, and either way, it wasn't STARTED to bash atheists. The how did you become atheist thread is all positive stories of atheists sharing how they became atheist. I'm not saying there aren't "believers" on here who get nasty, just that they're not starting threads to do it. I was going to say that it's more common to see threads started by atheists to bash religion, but looking through the first page of the forum again, I wouldn't really be able to back up that statement either. The "wives submit to your husbands" thread and the Trump voters who are Christian thread were pretty explicitly created to bash Christianity, but really most of the threads are just people asking about different religious practices/theologies (changes to Catholic Mass, why people go to confession, what's the Trinity, etc) or prayer requests.
Like I said, guess you haven’t been here long.
Either that or you aren’t being objective.
I'm very interested in comparative religion and discussion of morality and faith, so I lurk here more often than I would care to admit over the past 4 years. I've also just skimmed back over the last 6 pages of topics. As someone else pointed out, I had missed a thread bashing atheists about religious freedom on page 1. But other than that one, I didn't see any posts created to bash atheists, though, again, I might have missed one. Of course, bashing atheists ends up happening on a lot of threads, but it's not actually accurate to say that threads are created for that purpose. Certainly not any more than threads that are created to bash religion. In both cases, there are fewer threads than I would have thought whose goal is to bash each other.
Which threads, other than the religious freedom one, were started to bash atheists? Or would you like to amend your complaint to be about how threads often devolve into bashing? You can certainly make a stronger case for the latter.
Why should everyone else do your homework for you? I already pointed out a thread on the FIRST page that you conveniently missed. There are plenty of others that are specifically started to bash atheists. Just because you are too lazy to use your own eyeballs doesn't make it less true. Sounds like a white person who says racism doesnt exist because they haven't personally experienced it
Yes, and I admitted that I missed it and apologized. I also "did my homework" and went back 6 pages to look for more examples. I didn't find any. If there are more that I missed, please share your receipts. If not, just admit that people creating threads to bash atheists isn't a rampant problem and move on. Harping on this without backing up your claim isn't going to help change anyone's mind about the mean, bad Christians. It's just going to make you look paranoid.
DP and it is interesting to me that some atheists (maybe not PP) come on here claiming they intend to change minds - see the thread title! - but then are so grouchy when asked for data or reasoning to back up their claims. Note: I did not say all (some present really interesting arguments!). Note 2: I did not say PP who refuses to "do your homework" is one who intends to change any minds.
FWIW to those who do intend to change minds, what these attitudes certainly won't do is change hearts, and we all find ways to justify believing in what we love.
And you love the idea of fitting in to the society as it is and love the idea of living forever in heaven with God even though it doesn't make any sense at all.
Probably some of you also love Donald Trump, who is an atheist himself, but uses Christians (and everybody) as much as he can, for his own purposes.
Anonymous wrote:Have discussions on this religion forum influenced you either away from or towards religion? If away, how? And if towards, which religion and why?
There is not enough compassion and too much judgment by posters on all sides on this forum. Moments of genuine conversation are quickly interrupted by name calling and snark. So, no, the forum hasn't influenced my beliefs at all.
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
