Runa216 said:
timmah said:
I'm starting to think some of you atheists feel threatened by people of faith... why is this? There's not another good explanation for the way you attack. It's quite ironic that the atheists seem to be the most intolerant against opposing views, when us 'religious people' are supposedly the intolerant ones. |
HAve you been reading this entire thread? We DO feel threatened by people of faith becuase people of faith are fucking this world over in various ways. Sure, they do some good too, and I'd never stop them from that, but wars have been fought over religions, people have been killed, tortured, and persecuted over religion and for pathetic religious reasonings, much of the middle east is in unrest becuase of religion, and I bet those atheists in the twin towers were pretty fucking upset with 'people of faith' when someone's faith urged them to kill all the infidels. Not to mention scientists have had progress halted becuase of some religious ideaology claiming that 'stem cell research is against the word of god' or that 'Intelligent Design needs to be taught in schools', or that homosexuality is a sin, or...anything really.
There are so many repeated instances of religion infringing on the rights and freedoms of others that the world could actually make PROGRESS if it left religion in the past. you don't need God to get together with like minded people and donate to the poor. you don't need god to be kind to one another. you don't need god to dictate the laws of a civilized people. but you DO need god to justify hijacking a plane and flying it into a building that's carrying thousands of people who believe something different than you. you DO need god to convince you that walking into a crowded mall with a bomb strapped to your chest so you can go to heaven and be ravaged by 72 virgins. you DO need god to convince yourself that for some reason contraception is immoral (despite our population issues and the spread of STD's).
Normal people feel threatened by 'those of faith' when 'those of faith' are doing everything in their power to push their beliefs on others, and they're winning. we feel threatened becuase Atheists ARE the minority, and we are losing a battle against an enemy with an imaginary friend.
|
Again, citing the misuse of religion as the basis of your blatent hatred. I'm specifically talking about Christianity in the sense of living by the instructions and example Jesus taught. Though many evil things have been done in the name of religion, just as many have been done by sick people for any number of reasons (Adolf Hitler for example). The problem is not just religion, it's humans. Even without religion, we would find other things to kill each other over (natural resources, militant nationalism, racism, whatever). Violence is unfortunately the natural state of the human species. Christianity as taught by Jesus is the exact opposite message to violence and hatred. For example, in China it's the opposite. The government uses its power to openly persecute Christians, so obviously you don't need God to torture or be intolerant, humans do that just fine on their own. It doesn't automatically make all government or the idea of government bad just because some governments misuse their power.
On the stem cell thing, I haven't heard anybod argue stem cells are bad, but that harvesting them from babies is. This argument could be made with our without God in the picture. As far as scientific progress, I'm all for it as long as we're not doing horrible things to perpetuate it (such as the human testing the nazis did on the jews, that was evil).
I agree that religion has been used as a tool for all of those things, and I feel as strongly about stopping and speaking out agianst that aspect as you, but you're throwing out the baby with the bath water so to speak.
You say we don't need God to help the poor or have other laws to govern civilization, yet most of those laws and values find their origin in 'God' or Religion.
Christians who actually read the words of Jesus have been instrumental in the ending of many injustices. 'All men are created equal' (meaning people, not just males) is an expressed foundational belief that has lead to the ending of slavery, segregation, and has championed Women's rights in the western world among other things.
The over-arching point here is, without religion, people will still find plenty of reasons to do Evil things, the message I'm talking about is a very good way to combat this. The fact that you think religion is the problem shows you don't understand natural state of humanity. We can corrupt pretty much anything given half the chance.
