These Atheists… They’re Everywhere!

as is usual for this type of crap, comments are disabled on the original youtube page. so much for civil discourse.

John Turner spoke of an exchange with an atheist professor at an airport and said that the professor was embarrassed because he didn’t know Christian theology as well as Turner knew atheistic arguments. Turner said, “That is telling,” implying that this professor is now “ready” to be converted.

All it tells me is that atheists are willing to be proven wrong (or at least unprepared) in any argument, because they’re still willing to change perspectives and enrich their understanding of the conversation and topic. When a person of faith is exposed to being ignorant of a conflicting perspective or worse, proven wrong in an argument, a deus ex machina descends from the sky called “Faith” to rescue him and keep his original perspective intact.

Faith does not equal conviction.

We (the “new atheists”) attack with violence and venom? I’m sorry, but these people have their head in the sand. If you’ve ever seen Dawkins, Harris, etc. (the authors cited in the video) speak in person, they are polite, mild, and totally in control emotionally — as is Hemant. From my viewpoint, it’s Christians who have been violent and venomous, as many, many recent news stories and videos of Christian preachers confirm.

In addition, I’m glad this discussion has moved from academia to the public and popular spheres. That’s where it belongs. It’s too important for the average person to ignore. And, as Mr. Writerdd often tells me, “They started it.” If religious folk had kept religion quiet and in the personal sphere, we would have no reason to be speaking out so loudly in the public sphere. But they are the ones who took their beliefs and threw them in the rest of our faces, even to the point of trying to legislate religious so-called morality. And we should accept this in silence?

The speakers in this video only believe those with whom they disagree should shut up. Basically, my response to that is “not a chance.” My goal is to find more places to speak out loudly and without shame about atheism and to do everything I can to stop prejudice against unbelievers and to acheive public acceptance for those who don’t think that faith is a virtue and, yes, to get more young people to abandon faith.

Yep, Dan Brown, he’s a real promoter of atheism, he is.

“Atheism is the dominant secular religion…”

I love it when they call non-theism a religion; it gives me an excuse to grind my teeth and shake my fist.

I take pride in the fact that I try to give the other side a chance. I’ve read as many apologetic authors as I have read atheistic ones; and I really don’t think I’m the only one here who can say that. The fact is that there are only so many arguments you can make in favor of a deity, and all these religious defenders just repeat them over and over again.

When they say that Christianity is an anvil that has dulled many hammers, it sounds as if they are actually proud of their close-mindedness. I suppose this isn’t surprising, but I found it interesting that it seems so blatant here.

Mriana said,

December 30, 2007 at 10:59 am

I think you said with all those words let’s agree to disagree and can’t we all just get along?. Or something to that affect.

Renacier said,

Atheism is the dominant secular religion…”

I love it when they call non-theism a religion; it gives me an excuse to grind my teeth and shake my fist.

Then grind your teeth and shake your fist some more because i Happen to agree that many atheists treat atheism as if it were there religion. and what i find humorous is the same ones that are treating it (Atheism) like a religion are so proud of the fact that they practice no religion. Go figure.

JeffN said,

December 30, 2007 at 11:35 am

Mriana said,

December 30, 2007 at 10:59 am

I think you said with all those words let’s agree to disagree and can’t we all just get along?. Or something to that affect.

Yes and no. We need to fight extremism and dogmatism, but other than that, yes that is what I was saying.

JeffN said,

December 30, 2007 at 11:48 am

My last post got me wondering?. I suppose if Atheism were a religion God would be replaced with self But I can’t help but wonder what would be the atheist Bible. Evan the Humanist have the Humanist Manifesto One and Two.?.

Humanist Manifesto I, II, and III/2000. The Humanist Manifesto III is AHA’s and the 2000 is CSH’s. There was a split after the II.

Mriana said,

December 30, 2007 at 12:00 pm

Humanist Manifesto I, II, and III/2000. The Humanist Manifesto III is AHA’s and the 2000 is CSH’s. There was a split after the II.

I wasn’t aware of that Thank you for bringing it to my attention.

So Christian promoting their religion=Good.
Atheist promoting their beliefs=Bad.

That makes sense.

I love the professional Christian. What the hell is that? A person that goes to church more then just at Christmas and Easter? Give me a break.

A professional Christian must be someone who gets paid to be a Christian.

An interesting poem titled, “What is a Professional Christian?”

I saw that video earlier this morning — the stupid, it burns!

These guys are grossly misinformed and rely on fallacy after fallacy to eat up the eight minutes in that video. How can anyone take these smegheads seriously?

Hey, now… play nice! Ravi’s a brilliant man! As are R.C. Sproul, Os Guinness, and the likes… Not that they hold a candle up to the four horsemen.. Ah, the perfection!

It looks like we are limited to the following smiley faces with wordpress blogs. Mouse-over to see code. Some have additional alternative codes.

8)

I couldn’t find throwing up, so I will use to express myself for this video.

Mriana, “Yes, and I think the key to not taking life seriously is to not be extreme- in anything. Found in most religions is the idea of ‘moderation in all things’ and I think that is something that can be practiced even on the secular level. One does not need religion to practice moderation, but they do need an internal drive/determination to practice moderation.”

I have to disagree here, very strongly. Actually “extremism” and “moderation” do not denote much of anything. Everything all depends on who gets to determine what the extremes are. For example, when Richard Nixon took office, he could have killed all the Vietnamese (at one extreme) or he could have killed none of them (at the other). So, he was moderate and only killed a couple million of them.

For another example, read Martin Luther King Jr’s remarks on “extremism” in his letter from the Birmingham jail: he says that at first he was disturbed to be called an extremist by moderate whites and blacks, but then he realized that Jesus was an extremist too, and that it’s better to be an extremist for love and justice than to be a moderate for bigotry and injustice. While I don’t care whether Jesus was an extremist or a moderate, since he’s no role model of mine, I think King made a good point there. “Extremist” is an insult thrown by people who don’t want to think very hard, morally or otherwise.

You don’t need religion to practice any virtue or vice, since religion doesn’t own them. But I don’t consider “moderation” (or “extremism”) to be a virtue. For another handy quote, consider Jim Hightower’s quip “The only thing in the middle of the road is yellow stripes and dead armadillos.”

Duncan said,

You don’t need religion to practice any virtue or vice, since religion doesn’t own them.

I never said religion did.

The thing is, I don’t think you understand what I mean by moderation. I think the liberally religious and the liberal non-theists would be a form of moderation. I am not talking moderate religious beliefs though. I think you and I have been through this before, but if not, I’ll say it again, religion isn’t going to be destroyed- at least not in our lifetime, so we have to accept those who are not dogmatic and alike, while while speak up against the dogmatic and militant people- this includes militant atheists as well as religious militant extremists. To do that, we need the aide and help of the progressive and liberal religionists. The religious moderates are probably going to be the fence sitters.

“Extremist” is an insult thrown by people who don’t want to think very hard, morally or otherwise.

This is BS.

BryanJ said,

December 30, 2007 at 7:30 pm

It seems that it is surprisingly easy for an atheist be be labeled as violent or militant. What does a religionist need to do to acquire that label?

Be an Evangelical Religious Reich fundie.

Kyle O’Brien:

That part gave me the shivers. I found Dawkins’ “God Delusion” mediocre in many respects, but his chapter on religious indoctrination as child abuse really hit home for me.

I was brought up living on the grounds of an IVCF retreat camp (my parents were on staff), going to a very evangelical church, enrolled in sunday school and youth group without ever being offered a choice.

When I began to question my beliefs in college, it wasn’t because some professor with an agenda brainwashed me. I majored in religious studies because I was so surprised to find out that there were religions besides Christianity, and while reading theologians and scholars and mystics and ancient texts, I came to my own conclusions, thinking for myself for the first time.

I still have horrible anxiety attacks sometimes, worrying that I’ll go to hell or feeling guilty for abandoning something my family feels so strongly about. I 100% agree with Dawkins that calling a child a “Christian” child or a “Muslim” child is wrong. Seeing a report like this advocating even more stringent teaching of belief as fact to children makes my skin crawl, not just because I’m an atheist, but because I’ve suffered the consequences of being brought up that way.

I like how it takes a professor of literature, who may or may not have read past the title, to call The God Delusion a “screed.” I also like how they show another clip of him talking about teaching kids optimism, as if that had anything to do with what was being discussed.

All things considered, that could have been even less informed and more divisive than it was, so I’m not as upset as I could be. The only thing that really offended me was the guy who thinks Christianity can take credit for free speech. He said these authors should try giving a lecture in the Middle East; well, I think they’d get just about the same response in the Deep South. Or in any European country in the dark ages, when Christianity was the state religion as Islam is in modern dark-age countries now.

The only thing that really offended me was the guy who thinks Christianity can take credit for free speech.

Yeah, more of that infuriating Christian rewriting of U.S. history. Blasphemy laws Are still on the books in several states. They weren’t declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court until 1952.

It isn’t Christianity’s benevolence toward free speech and free inquiry that makes it safer (not safe) to openly challenge religious assumptions here, it’s the fact that their aging grip on society is weakening. They’re losing 75% (if their statistics are correct) of college students because society is slowly growing up and won’t accept child-like explanations for the world around them.

That growth is not going to reverse because they try to characterize a few books that have compelling points as “violent,” or “screeds.” Lotsa luck.

Sarah H., you might be interested in this ex-fundamentalist support group.

Your anxiety attacks are quite normal, although they usually fade with time. You didn’t say how long ago you left your faith behind. For me it’s been about 15 years. I don’t have daytime anxiety any more, but I still have anxious dreams that sometimes slip into becoming nightmares.

“But I can’t help but wonder what would be the atheist Bible.”

Now that would be fun to write.

1In the beginning nothing created heaven, and earth–heaven and earth all came well after the beginning. 2 And the earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and then a few amino acids…

Linda,

I just figured out that to do a blushing smiley face, use this: (mouse-over to see code)

I was brought up living on the grounds of an IVCF retreat camp (my parents were on staff), going to a very evangelical church, enrolled in sunday school and youth group without ever being offered a choice.

Hi Sarah, and Welcome! My sympathies on your background – yipes. I was very involved in IV during college and even met my (still-fundy) husband there, so I know how much damage the indoctrination can do when you are fed all this stuff as a child before developing the brain skills to do rational thinking.

I take exception to this notion that all atheists should have to be well versed in Scripture and Christian apologetics to have credibility for their views. That would only be so if they are specifically arguing against a Christian claim.

I don’t argue against Christianity, I argue against believing anything without evidence. The evidence should be provided by the person making the claim. Christians come to me and make claims. I don’t go to them making claims. I just politely say please show me the evidence to back up your claims. All they come back with is arguments for their claims but without evidence. Why the heck should I waste my time reading a bunch of old stuff that has failed to provide any evidence for two thousand years? Apologetics are arguments. Arguments are not evidence. Evidence is evidence.

Karen: Yeah, it’s odd because in some ways IVCF is one of the more liberal “campus ministries” out there, as compared to CCC and His House, among others. Yet the evangelical focus was so frenzied that I grew up vaguely aware that many of the adults in my life (including my grandparents) were hoping I’d become a missionary some day. I’ve always heard about the poor kids whose parents pressure them to be doctors or lawyers or run the family business…. but this seems even more messed up, in retrospect.

At my university, the IV group was definitely more on the “intellectual” side, compared to Campus Crusade and a group called BASIC (Brothers and Sisters in Christ) which was for black Christians – yes, the campus Christian groups were (voluntarily) segregated at my public university in California.

I guess they’re more “liberal” but that’s a pretty relative term. For instance, we hosted this guy from an ex-gay ministry at one of our meetings, and the campus gay group protested us. It turned into a big controversy. But we were convinced that homosexuality was caused by sin and could be “reversed” by prayer. So in terms of social issues we were anything but liberal!

I went to a missionary conference called Urbana – you probably know it – so I was headed toward being a missionary myself! Thankfully, I never got the chance.

Karen:

Yeah, my dad is still on staff with InterVarsity and takes a group to Urbana every year it takes place. The camp I grew up at (one of four major IVCF camps in the US) is devoted to training college students to basically convert other college students to Christianity. There’s a strong focus on the veracity of the Bible and on the consequences of dying without being “saved” that seems to drive so many of the staff workers and students involved into a frenzy of concern for anyone not indoctrinated.

And yes, it’s one of the more liberal college ministries. It’s really awkward whenever I visit my hometown, since while my parents don’t still live on the grounds of the camp, they live nearby and the other families who grew up there are close friends. It was so weird this week to see the kids who lived next door, who are in college now and are all still hardcore Christians. I find myself wondering what made me different… they don’t all go to Christian schools, and I wouldn’t say I’m necessarily the smartest in the bunch…

I feel lucky to have had the chance to really step outside my IVCF upbringing and choose a different path – a choice I’m afraid lots of my friends and my siblings didn’t ever know they had, in a sense.

What is a “responsible xian perspective”? LOL. As for “xian writers”, I thought you all you had to do was read the Bible. What makes people think that any of these preachers and theologians understand it better than they do? Wasn’t that Luther’s point? That everyone had direct access and didn’t have to go through a church hierarchy.

I’m going to add this page to my favorites list just for all the little smiley faces. Thanks Jeff.

It’s good news about 75% of college students though. There’s hope for North America after all.

That is good news, but I wonder how long the “college effect” lasts? In the past, people often strayed from religion during their young adult years only to come back to the faith once they were married and had children.

It may be that this newer generation won’t feel the pressure to go back to church once they have children, if we have a more secular society overall and there’s less emphasis on church being the only way to instill morals in kids.

Karen said:

That is good news, but I wonder how long the “college effect” lasts?

You are right about the kids. I had a coworker once that went on and on for two years about how her Catholic upbringing ruined her life and how awful it was. Then she got pregnant and I (jokingly) asked if she was going to raise the kid Catholic, and she said (not jokingly) yes. I pointed out that we had all listened to her for years about how horrible it was and she said “there were good things” and refused to discuss it any more.

Perhaps it’s the responsibility of having to think and care about someone besides themselves.