We should be quaking in our jackboots: a media counterattack is being launched against us wicked atheists. They have a website!
American Vision is launching a relentless and systematic response to militant atheism. We’ve produced a brilliant 2-minute commercial that we plan to broadcast globally via the Internet and Television. Atheists present themselves as enlightened and civil. But this new commercial will reveal the shocking truth to viewers. The French Revolution, Communism, Nazism, etc. have taught us that the atheistic worldview will inevitably lead to the persecution of Christians and the killing of anyone who gets in the way. What’s worse is that atheism is paving a wide road for Islam to advance in our nation and around the world.
Inevitable killing? Wow. I had no idea. Personally, I was going to draw the line at inevitable hickies. (That’s a joke, son … there is no advocacy of literal violence of any kind by me and Dawkins, at least.) I’m not impressed that they couldn’t even get through the first paragraph of their website without lying.
The idea that we’re paving the road for Islam is a little strange, too. I don’t like Islam at all; the noisy atheists aren’t advocating for any religion. It’s as if the old accusation that atheists were all in league with Satan has now been replaced with the claim that we’re closet Muslims. It’s also odd because if any violence has been advocated by these atheists, it’s by Harris and Hitchens against Islam.
They’ve made a “brilliant” commercial! For those of you who dislike quicktime, here’s the synopsis. It’s all read by a cheerful, chirpy woman who sounds like she’s reciting from a children’s book.
“Sam Harris uses words like ‘rational,’ ‘reason,’ and ‘real,'” and thinks god isn’t real.”
“Richard Dawkins doesn’t believe in god either, and thinks that parents who raise their kids to believe in god should be arrested.” He has said,
“The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is at the bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good. Nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”
“Robespierre used words like ‘reason’ and ‘rational.’ He also like to kill people who disagreed with him.” Then we get a series of pictures of people being guillotined.
“Maybe if more people listened to Sam and Richard, we could all be more reasonable and rational like Robespierre. Maybe we could have our own reign of terror for people who continue to be irrational and believe silly storybooks like the Bible.” Then another montage of Nazis and murdered Jews and aborted babies and black men being lynched.
“If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.”
“The fool hath said in his heart, ‘there is no God.'”
By golly, it sounds like rather than appropriating rationality, reason, and reality, these people are declaring war on them! Nice to know. Even using the words makes you a head-choppin’ amoral murderer, you see. This is a really fun game, though — let’s play!
“GW Bush uses words like ‘family,’ ‘church,’ and ‘god.’ So does Dick Cheney. So did Adolf Hitler. Therefore, the Bush administration is preparing to invade Poland.”
“Augustine of Hippo talked about “force” and “destruction”. So did the Prophet Mohammed. So did Zippy the Pinhead. Therefore, the principles of the Abrahamic religions are clownish non sequiturs.”
That website and commercial did make my day, though. It’s so reassuring to know that our opponents are hysterical idiots.
Smug beyond belief.
It’s all true though. I read ‘The God Delusion’ and the very next day I committed mass genocide and ethnic cleansing. Oops.
So without God holding them back, *they* would be raping, pillaging, ethnic cleansing, etc? I guess that explains it…
They can attack us ad hominem as much as they please (and, granted, we do, too), but we atheists have something they don’t: attacks against the their [theists’] basic principles. I’ve yet to hear an even remotely good argument for why there cannot not be a god.
Great retort and analysis, PZ! I knew you could do it!
How about some slick advertising of the data enumerated in
“Victims of the Christian Faith” at:
http://www.truthbeknown.com/victims.htm
(This site also has a neat video which shows the parallels between ancient sun worship and latter-day Christianity.)
It would just make them howl even louder about being “persecuted”. Bring it on, baby!!!
Incidentally, now that she says it, Robespierre was a man of God, who wanted the state to recognize a supreme being.
What about Hitler claiming in Mein Kampf that he was only finishing what Christ started? Or the Nazi defendants saying that if Martin Luther were alive, he would be sitting right next to them?
But never mind, I didn’t think she actually cared about history.
I love the voice they use for Dawkins…
Re: The voice in the video – Wow, it’s amazing that the anti-atheists managed to get Dolores Umbridge working for them! She’s tough, we’d better watch out now or we’ll all be getting scars on our hands that say “I Must Not Tell Lies About God”
Or, should we say: “Come, Lord Jesus, come!”
I’m always terrified by people who posit that everybody would rape and murder everybody else were it not for the fear of hell or the reward of heaven. Just what, I must wonder, are their fantasies? What would they do, were they not checked by their fear of invisible grandpa? They scare me a lot more than somebody who says “it never even crossed my mind to rape or murder anybody, but if it did, I wouldn’t because I think it would hurt them.” Empathy is better than religion. Lack of empathy means you’re a sociopath, not a saint.
Uh oh. According to Godwin’s Law you’ve lost your argument… But then they also used a Hitler comparison… You’ve both lost the argument?
mndarwinist:
My first, immediate reaction when reading Luther’s plan for the Jews — this was while going through Avalos’s Fighting Words (2005) — was, “Sweet zombie Jesus, I’m glad that man didn’t have Zyklon-B.”
PZ Myers:
Let’s not even get into that Noah-cursing-Canaan thing, OK? Yeah, because Genesis 1 is really important — well, make that “an artificially harmonized combination of Genesis 1 and 2 is important” — but Genesis 9 isn’t worth bothering about.
Typical lying for Jeebus.
The little bit about Sam Harris thinking “evolution is a fact” is a nice touch, though. It reminds every fair-minded observer of just how deranged and deluded many of the faithful are. Couldn’t ask for better opponents.
mndarwinist: you need to understand christian logic. When Hitler said, “By killing the Jews, I am carrying out God’s work” and had his soldiers wearing belt buckles that said “God with Us,” it means he is an atheist. But Einstein, who said “I do not believe in a personal god,” was actually a christian.
Anybody whose done any voiceover recording is cringing when they hear that. Wow! That is one cheap, piece of crap. Where did they get that woman? What a terrible commercial. The Dawkins voice is hilarious, too. He sounds like an American doing his best British accent, which is to say, not very good.
Cheap, cheap, cheap. Did they pay for that?
phat
That was fantastic.
However, why is it that the anti-atheist stuff tends to cost so much. It seems I can get massive amounts of atheistic hate-speech and islamopaving for free, but I can’t get one of their books for anything reasonable. Save that one commercial which was *awesome*.
Robespierre was a man of God. You can tell by the blood in the street.
Reminded me of a funny Dilbert not too long ago…
Dilbert: What are you doing?
Dogbert (behind laptop): I’m debating on the Internet!
Dogbert: HA HA! I´m winning every argument by saying the same thing!
Dilbert: What´s that?
Dogbert: “How would you like it if Hitler killed you?”
Dilbert: Hey, I debated you last night!
http://www.fstdt.com/fundies/comments.aspx?id=15495
I wish I’d never clicked the website link.
To the religiously retarded those thoughts are equivalent.
<snark pharyngula-insider-joke=”90%”%gt;
Whoa! Has Scott Adams finally twigged to the pointlessness of Nazi comparisons in online “debate”? Wow! He’s only sixteen years behind the rest of the world.
</snark>
…
…
The spiky iron fist in the velvet glove of Christianity starts to show itself … again.
The same techniques have been used throughout history to demonize Jews, blacks, gays, everybody who had a new idea or a individual voice.
The next several years could be tough for freethinkers. I expect rising vilification, a vast sea of lies and hate, and no small amount of violence. All from nice Christians. And all with near-unlimited funding.
…
…
Bob @ #10: They started it.
We need to dust off that Swift Boat Veterans against Jesus ad.
Very precious, the way they capitalize not only Internet, but Television.
“Broadcast globally by the Internet and Television”, eh? I guess that means someone uploaded it to Youtube and it’ll air on the Jesus-oriented cable channels around 2 AM.
So we better be aware of the threats coming from Rome: According to Radio Vatican
B16 is using these words regularly (emphasis mine)
Be aware of B16!
“The next several years could be tough for freethinkers. I expect rising vilification, a vast sea of lies and hate, and no small amount of violence. All from nice Christians. And all with near-unlimited funding. ”
Yeah, you’re right. But that’s just like every other year, except maybe the rising levels part. The level of animosity and violence certainly varies over time, but I can’t think of a year it’s been zero.
I watched the commercial, and the “cheerful, chirpy” children’s-book voice reminded me quite a bit of Brian Flemming’s style (he wrote and narrated the movie The God Who Wasn’t There,the Blasphemy Challenge, and numerous UTube videos.) I suspect he influenced them. “American Vision” appears to be modeling itself after the Rational Response Squad.
The other thing that struck me was how they clearly misunderstood Dawkins’ quote on the universe having the properties we would expect if, at bottom, there is …nothing but blind, pitiless indifference. The important clause is that this is true “at bottom” — at the fundamental level of physics and chemistry. Complex things like morals and meaning grow up — evolve — from simpler things. He is certainly NOT saying that humans themselves should have no purposes, no goodness, and be blind, pitiless, and indifferent. But they don’t get that.
Is theism just an overblown Genetic Fallacy? Like must come from like, or the alternative is reductionism of the greediest kind. If there’s no God, then we have to treat each other as if we were giant molecules, and bump into each other with blind, pitiless indifference.
When Nietzsche wrote that God is Dead, he wasn’t referring to belief in a traditional deity but faith in some absolute value. In that respect, as many people have pointed out, the Stalinists and other nominally atheistical ideologues act as religious fanatics. In any case, it is not the case that if God is dead, everything is permitted; for in the absence of God or a God-substitute like the dialectic or the master race or the dear leader, nothing whatsoever is permitted because there is nobody around with a license to do the permitting. Indeed, the serious bitch about serious atheism is precisely that it makes people timid since it removes the source of authority they need in order to act with passion.
Aside from this being a pathetic advertisement (the writers/actors should be snuckered at sunrise), this is yet another “christian” web site begging for your money (“money makes the world go around”) so they can hurry up and quash the uprising. Doesn’t this make you just want to send them your hard-earned money? Pathetic cheap bastards – give them money to save your soul, give them money to save the world, give them money to …. “there’s a sucker born every minute.”
Umm…dude…the Ku Klux Klowns have always claimed to be Christian.
Thank you, PZ for the transcript. Listening to that pitiful commercial felt like being beaten over the head by the saccharine cudgel of ignorance(to mix a metaphor).
Bobryuu:
I’d say that Godwin doesn’t apply here (personally I think it’s a bit overused) because –
1) He’s not actually comparing them personally to Nazis.
and
2) Unlike most applications of Godwin’s Law, it’s actually germane to the conversation at hand.
It’s always been my interpretation that the autofail clause really only applies to instances where someone whips out the Nazi menace as a convenient insult or inappropriately derogative comparison. If you are, for instance, discussing white supremacists or skinhead culture then I’d say bringing up Hitler may very well be required to get your point across.
Why are such people so irresponsible that they need something outside of reality dictating their rules and codes of conduct to them? Do they simply feel, without the figure of God enforcing some ephemeral policy, that there are no laws in the world that humans would follow?
I’m not an Atheist, I’m Agnostic. While I do not say there is no God, I say simply that we can’t know within the realm of can be tested or observed or measured and I make no assumption as to whether or not there exists a realm which cannot be tested or measured. What really bothers me is that people use this godhead as free license to suspend or create rules which enable society to run. It is a way for people to become entirely blameless in their own conduct.
I don’t not believe in the God you don’t believe in..er, i mean, I believe in the God that you don’t not believe…um..hold on..
Forget it…i just cant do that belief crap. Guess I’ll go eat some babies.
Hitler was a staunch Catholic. Never figured out how he got lumped in with the atheists.
The current leaders in mass murder are all moslem. Killing mostly other moslems. Since when is Islam an atheist religion? Constradiction in terms.
One thing about the internet. It is the best thing that ever happened to morons and nuts. Anyone can put a website and say anything.
Now, that’s unsettling. Better hide our militant atheist AK-47’s and militant atheist torture devices, lest they’ll reveal all our militant atheist atrocities against mankind.
Blake’s Law never looked better.
Somehow, I’m not at all surprised by this, given as how this is a group of people who take Martin Luther’s ranting about Reason being the whore of Satan to heart.
You are so going on the no-fly list.
Wow, that is a strong example of the kind of arrested character development that enough people have that makes me wish I was born in another galaxy. That real adults with driver’s licenses and mortgages and so forth put that out makes me very sad.
Thanks. I learned a lot from that video – like the need to suppress and oppose anyone who argues using words like reason, rational, and real.
How does group identity differ between liberals and conservatives?
Saying you are a Conservative and acting like one is enough- you need never utter anything more than you agree, and that’s right, and yes sir. There is no special knowledge other than that you agree and obey.
Saying you are a Liberal comes with the weight of actually having to allow others (even the dumb conservatives) to be themselves, and having the wherewithall to run your own life without having someone else telling you how to live, and what is acceptable, and who to hate/exclude/persecute/vilify/etc.
The added overhead of having to think for yourself, define your own universe, accept the unexplained, decide what it means to be alive, and speak articulately (as opposed to merely parroting what your favorite talking head has said recently) is too much for most people.
Oops- I almost forgot the largest obstacle for most people which also comes along with being a liberal: being adult enough to admit when you are wrong, and graceful enough to carry on afterward.
It’s very easy to see why a lie is more acceptable than all that extra work, and why being a conservative is so much more attractive for so many people. Giving up a lie which is incorporated into the foundation of your reality has to be such a hassle.
Bobryuu,
they invoked Hitler and Nazism as a “consequence of atheism” in the first paragraph on the home page of their website. It doesn’t constitute “invoking Hitler” to include discussions about same when responding to them. I would have thought that should be pretty obvious.
Arlice Davenport says:
Well then, pretty much everybody will lack credibility for the foreseeable future. Oh, and Davenport, Why is there God? You’ll understand if I question your own credibility until you can answer that.
Uh, oh! Hickies are considered violence? I’m a serial person-of-the-opposite-sex abuser? Who knew?
The fundie cult of lie and violence strikes again. Several of their examples of murderous atheists were, in fact, murderous religious adherents. Robespierre was a Deist, Hitler was a Catholic. I’m sure they aren’t very bright but they are also lazy. I looked it up in wikipedia in 2 minutes. OTOH, what is one more lie among the pack of lies?
http://www.arkalive.com/
*smashes its morphined little head against the keyboard*
hey, i can’t feel that. if anyone wants me, y’all know where i’ll be.
Lepht
Because he was a bad man who did bad things, and since no Real Christian™ could ever possibly do bad things, he must have really been an Atheist.
QED
“Thank you for watching another episode of Out of Context Theatre.”
Oh, good!
This post reminded me that I have to retrieve my jack boots from the shoe repair shop.
Thanks!
At least they are honest in stating up front that they are against rationality and reason. It’s refreshing to finally see that they no longer consider being irrational and deluded as a failure.
I use words like “five,” “hungry,” “is,” and “and.”
Hitler used words like “five,” “hungry,” “is,” and “and.”
Jesus used words like “five,” “hungry,” “is,” and “and.”
I might need the Physicist to help me with the philosophy here, but does this mean I can conclude that PYGMIES + DWARFS??
It’s like a 2 minute summary of the common bizarre ‘atheism is evil’ arguments. I suppose in a way they’ve done us a service by boiling down the basic stupidities into a single, convenient passage.
Of course it’s a series of quick quotes, bad assumptions, and manipualtory extrapolations. But we should expect that.
On the other hand, this may have the advantage of providing a “gloves are off” moment. If they’re going to claim atheism leads to all kinds of evil, then let’s see how well their religion does under such speculation . . .
Firstly, Dawkins does not advocate criminal prosecution of religious parents, secondly, Robespierre and most of the other members of the Committee of Public Safety were deists, thirdly, Nazism was faith based, they even wore nice shiny “Gott Wit Uns” belt buckles, fourthly, the KKK was a Christian organization, and I’d be willing to bet that a black man was never lynched by an atheist during the racist period that plagued the Bible Belt for centuries, and lastly, if Christians believe the Bible is what keeps them from murdering their neighbours, they have a very skewed sense of morality.
Yawn.
This is kind of embarrassing but, um…well…I am a closet atheist Muslim; I don’t pray to Mecca five times a day. There, I said it, and I’d do it all over again, too.
(Somebody needed to get that joke out of the way, and I figured since I wasn’t doing anything…)
What worries me is how often I’ve heard it from ministers and priests.
Just what do they teach at seminary school, anyway?
I saw a few minutes of a broadcast church service last weekend in which the pastor opened with a “joke” about an atheist college professor who told his class that he would “prove” that God doesn’t exist by standing in a circle for 30 minutes and demanding that God knock him out of it, and when 29 minutes had passed a big football player in the class punched the professor in the head knocking him out of the circle and saying, “God sent me.” Oh the hilarity. I can’t remember the last joke I told that literally suggested that it was OK to hit someone in the head for disagreeing with my position on something. Religionists who get their feelings hurt by mere criticism, while the history of religion has been one of near-unrelenting atrocity, are welcome to hickey my butt.
But why have practitioners of atheistic philosophies under governments that were officially atheistic committed so MANY murders…I mean, we are talking about 100 million people.
Sure, sure, I know…you can call religious people delusional (Dawkins) and child abusers (Dawkins AND Dennet) and call for preserving religion…in ZOOS…but you really don’t mean Christians any harm.
And we are supposed to take your word on it?
You all wouldn’t LIE would you?
…the atheistic worldview will inevitably lead to the persecution of Christians and the killing of anyone who gets in the way.
That’s some claim about the future.
Unfortunately, us atheists are a little handicapped since we usually restrict our claims about religion to what has observably already happened.
OH NOES!!! TH3YZ G0NN4 B R3L3NTL355!!!!1!!1!
I watched it twice and it’s just as hysterical and idiotic on the second viewing. In fact, I think this has the makings of a classic.
Ya gotta give them points for that.
Yeah Banner. We’re all liars because we’re atheists.
Tool.
A Christians have never persecuted anyone ever.
I mean Christians no harm whatsoever since I love several Christians, including my dear daughter, very much. Part of my love for these Christians is my opposition to superstition, including theism, which I think does many people great harm. I would never advocate or tolerate violence in achieving a goal that I will not lie about in the least: I aim to weaken the grip of religion on the human mind as much as one person reasonably can. And for what it’s worth, I consider Christianity to be probably less of a threat to humankind than several other superstitions are, including Islam and Marxism.
John: “…even wore nice shiny “Gott Wit Uns” belt buckles”
Did a quick GIS and it looks like its actually “Gott Mit Uns”:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/vance/wwii-buckle.jpg
Which strikes me as being really funny. For some reason I picture a cute little ‘LOL-meme’ kitten in full Nazi regalia (with or without mittens) and the caption “GOTT MITUNZ?”
…wait, what were we talking about again?
“Sure, sure, I know…you can call religious people delusional (Dawkins) and child abusers (Dawkins AND Dennet) and call for preserving religion…in ZOOS…but you really don’t mean Christians any harm.”
You know, it’s always YOU guys who make the mental leap from criticism of delusions and indoctrination to gulags and physical harm.
Tells a lot about how you think, doesn’t it?
Ya, that’s right. My German skills are virtually non-existent.
It actually makes debate with Fundies that much easier (as if it wasn’t already…) when they make dumb claims like that Hitler was an atheist. I hope they continue.
Its okay John, my German is limited to Gesundheit and some common food items. I just wanted to see the belt buckle and happened to notice that.
Scotty B
Yes, that’s right. My German skills are virtually non-existent.
I hope fundies continue to makes these dumb claims about history. It makes debate with them that much easier, as it weren’t easy enough already. Once some Christian on youtube claimed that a ravenous pack of atheists and evolutionists slaughtered 200 000 Tasmanians in the 19th century. Unfortunately for him, there were only about 5000 on the island at the time, and in reality all that happened was that a couple scientists stole a few cadavers that had been killed by British Christian colonists. Making up history seems to be an art among the faithful.
Who wants to join my pool on when someone plagiarises the Protocols of the Elders of Zion to implicate atheists in the world-domination plot?
Banner, don’t be a fool. Atheists aren’t “out to get you.” It’s pure fear-mongering. It’s propaganda designed to manipulate your emotions, and it seems to have worked in your case.
Stop letting yourself be controlled by your emotions. Let go of fear. Embrace reason. When you do that, your dependence upon religion will fall away of its own accord.
Reminds me of an expensive newsletter I received at work from the fundies. Very nicely done, in that “There are three kinds of lies – lies, damned lies and statistics” kind of way. The interesting part was at the heart, where they gave it all away – they very clearly say that the problem isn’t modernism, or even the enlightenment. It’s the f*c*ing Renaissance where it all fell apart!
I’m just glad they wasted 50 cents mailing it to me. You’d think they’d filter the list to remove biologists, chemists and physicists. But I guess it’s worth the cash, since there’s always one crazy one, who thinks we could’ve stopped with Aristotle.
Hickies ‘Я’ Blushphemy!
That video makes me feel like I’m trapped in a hellish recurring nightmare in which talking mosquitos fly in and out of my ears and suck my brain dry with their probiscuits and or are they like straws or wands or what hey wow Dolores Umbridge was there and so were you, and you, and you and you! Has anybody seen my dog?
[insert Stalin and Pol Pot discussions here]
[insert correct Third Reich and KKK information here]
[slap self awake]
John: “if Christians believe the Bible is what keeps them from murdering their neighbours, they have a very skewed sense of morality.”
You’re being too nice. They lack any sense of morality whatsoever. If I were to be inhibited from my killing my neighbor because I might get punished, that’s not a moral act, but simply rational self-interest. By such a moral code, if I were to decide that the pleasure of murdering my neighbor outweighed the punishment, I would have carte-blanche to go forward.
You can’t call that a moral system at all, unless you define “morality” to include the behavioral systems of serial killers and politicians.
If I were to write or speak supporting atheism in a public forum, I would emphasize that I support freedom of religion and democratic values, and abhor totalitarianism of any kind.
And had suspected atheists sent to the guillotine.
LOL. That sounds worth the effort in PhotoShop…
“By such a moral code, if I were to decide that the pleasure of murdering my neighbor outweighed the punishment, I would have carte-blanche to go forward.”
Ah, but you see, the punishment of Hell outweighs ALL pleasures! So it’s a GOOD moral code!
That video is getting funnier by the minute.
Wow! So, without their Godly goodness, they’d be murdering and mutilating precious white babies here in the ol’ U.S. of A. instead of exterminating those little brown potential terrorists over in Iraq. Wait…aren’t they the same ones whose motto seems to be “save ’em now, kill em’ later” when it comes to abortion and sending our kids off to be cannon fodder? I’m so confused. I’m an atheist, and I keep doing the good stuff that the Xtians claim they’re doing. What’s going on?
Atheists have no fear of eternal damnation hanging over our heads and we seem to behave morally… it even could be argued more so than many christians.
Doesn’t really jive with their freaky alternate reality where we’re all eating babies for breakfast and kicking puppies down the street.
Am I the only one that thought the commercial was funny and actually rather effective? I don’t agree with it at all, but I thought it did a good job of making the atheist point of view seem rather ridiculous or at least unappealing. (I totally agree with the Dawkins quote too, but see why “the other side” might use it to make atheism seem like a depressing worldview)
But mostly I thought the chirpy “This is Sam. Sam likes to think” thing was quite funny. I guess it is hard for most people to see the merit in something that advocates an opposing point of view.
Somebody’s projecting again.
At least “atheism is paving a wide road for Islam to advance” made me laugh out loud.
The producer of an ad like this aught to have had a particular audience and a clear set of objectives in mind.
As best I can make out, the primary goal here was to increase the level of irrational fear in the Chrisitian flock at large, without concern for possibly triggering aggressive behaviour in some individual Christians.
Classic ‘us’ vs. ‘them’ fearmongering used by all kinds of power-grasping wannabe leaders down through history.
Think of it as another acknowledgement of the success of our recent high visibility, thanks to Dawkins et al.
So, which of Jesus’ teachings have they drawn on for this, I wonder? P
resumably the bit where He said, I mean He sayeth: ‘And if anyone questions the existence of the Lord thy God go forth and make crude propaganda videos mis-representing their point of view and suggesting that the culprits are in league with the devil, not fit to be Americans etc. etc..’
Or was that in one of his mate Paul’s letters?
Rey, you forget all the masochists in the world. A good Christian masochist would want to go to “Hell”, and therefore is morally impelled to rape, murder and pillage.
Don’t think that my argument is absurd. It’s been a running heresy from the second century on!
This, from Wiki, explains a lot:
In this speech, Robespierre made it clear that his concept of a Supreme Being was far different from the traditional God of Christianity. Robespierre’s Supreme Being was a radical democrat, like the Jacobins,
“Is it not He whose immortal hand, engraving on the heart of man the code of justice and equality, has written there the death sentence of tyrants? Is it not He who, from the beginning of time, decreed for all the ages and for all peoples liberty, good faith, and justice? He did not create kings to devour the human race. He did not create priests to harness us, like vile animals, to the chariots of kings and to give to the world examples of baseness, pride, perfidy, avarice, debauchery, and falsehood. He created the universe to proclaim His power. He created men to help each other, to love each other mutually, and to attain to happiness by the way of virtue.”[3
It’s all read by a cheerful, chirpy woman who sounds like she’s reciting from a children’s book.
Dolores Umbridge.
I don’t want to sound like I’m on the other side, but I kind of have to disagree with the implication that atheists are moral independent of self interest, as much as we like to think otherwise.
I know that if I, say, cheat people regularly, others will catch on eventually, and they will (out of their own self interest) stop trusting me and being friends with me, which hurts me in lots of tangible ways. Even if I can behave immorally when others aren’t around to see, it means I have to either outright lie, or at least maintain the illusion of being moral in order to keep people on my side.
Sure, these things become second nature, and we don’t necessarily consciously think of our self interest when “being nice”, but then again, I doubt most religious people consciously think of heaven and hell when making the same sort of decisions.
Sorry if I’m in a “devils advocate” mood today, but sometimes it bugs me when I see fellow atheists getting all sanctimonious about how they are more moral than others.
Frankly, I don’t care if a person is being nice because they want presents from santa, want to go to heaven, think that they will have more friends if they are generally nice, or that they are nice “for the sake of being nice”, whatever that means. The important thing is they are not mean.
Relentless? Like the Dark Ages or the wonderful old glory days of the Inquisition? Are they going to be that kind of relentless?
If so, I’m getting a gun.
Rob,
You come to conclusions too quickly. The crazy-fundy claim is that without mortal self-interest, there is no moral behavior. The counter-claim does not have to be that self-interest is irrelevant to morality, but simply that self-interest does not fully encompass morality, at least in any short-term, individual manner.
If we take the crazy-fundies at their word, they are only being good because big Daddy has a stick, which would make them essentially amoral. Most sane morality is based on a combination of self-interest and other-interest, sometimes being fitted under some utilitarian rubric (such as identification with the community).
Additionally, it does matter “Why” someone is nice. In the short term, sure all that matters is the niceness. But if morality is purely, 100% a calculation of personal interest, I suggest that you never turn your back on that individual. If they don’t have either a code of honor, or identification with something larger than themselves, they simply can not be counted on. Society is ultimately based on what we all do when no one is looking – there’ll never be enough cops to make rational self-interest equivalent to decency.
Motivation counts. We’re primates reading each other’s minds all the time.
Also, you’ve got to distinguish the crazy-fundy moral code from religious codes in general. My claim was not that I was morally superior to all religious people – just the crazy fundies. Most religious groups do not derive morality from Big Daddy with the stick; they just stop at Big Daddy.
Catholic theology, for example, doesn’t say that morality inheres solely in the fear of “God”, but also includes love of God and love of others. There may be points where we can argue, but I wouldn’t claim that standard Catholicism lacks morality – I just disagree with it.
In the same way, feudal Japanese warriors had a morality. I think it was incorrect, but it was clearly a morality including self-interest and other interest.
But the crazy-fundies? They are amoral cretins.
‘Theology’, which is a collection of mutually-contradictory assertions about a supposed entity, and ‘rhetoric’, which is the tool used to make the collection palatable.
Robespierre also used words like ‘heaven,’ ‘justice’ and ‘morality.’
In fact, on occasion Robespierre was not above using the definite article.
Hmm. The motto of Nazi Germany was “Gott mit uns”, and at every Klan rally they have a benediction.
Cheese’s crust, that ad was bad. I guess before they try their hand at humor they should hire outsiders who have a sense of it.
I’m gonna side with frog on his one, rob. when I asked my crazy fundie aunt why there were dinosaurs, she shrieked at me not to ask questions. then she threw away my babysitter’s club books because they were fiction; of course, she still let me read Black Beauty and Alice in Wonderland.
my other experience with fundies, alas is online, so I cannot say whether this is true in his warped reality…but I asserted that atheists aren’t hacking up babies with chainsaws in the streets because we don’t have the Bible as moral guidance. the response? no, we’re just aborting them in the womb. I sh*t you not. they think all atheists abort babies regularly.
This *ahem* RED herring has been dealt with., At lenght. Repeatedly. I think the best treatment is here.
Just out of curiosity, have you ever met a single atheist who did not deplore the atrocities of Communist governments at least as much as you do?
The definition of a “delusion” is a false belief that is held in spite of being unsupported by evidence and even in spite of contradictory evidence. By “delusional” we mean we consider the man who declares that the earth is 6,000 years old and ruled by an omnipotent, omniscient, and morally good god, to be no more credible than the man who ties a towel around his neck to make a cape, announces to horrified onlookers that he can fly, and leaps off a skyscraper to his death. The only difference is the accessibility of the contradictory evidence to the average person.
By “child abuse” we mean that we do not see a meaningful difference between a parent who threatens to lock his or her child in a closet for a week without food when the child “misbehaves” and a parent who teaches their children to mindlessly obey the child’s parents and religious leaders out of fear of being tortured for eternity in hell. In fact, some evidence suggests that the threat of hell is more psychologically damaging to children than many instances of physical and even sexual abuse.
Got a source for that “zoos” remark?
As opposed to what?
Is there any objective reason why we should be regarded as any less credible than the nice-nice TV pastors with the winning smiles and the obvious ulterior motives? Can you name even one?
Hitler certainly wasn’t an atheist, but I don’t think it would correct to describe him as a stauch Catholic. As I understand it, he was raised Catholic, but he made many statements during the Third Reich that seem pretty explicitly anti-Christian, and many in the Nazi hierarchy, himself included, had a deep interest in the occult, incorporating much of symbology and rituals into Nazism. He was clearly deeply interested in the supernatural, but I don’t think the Catholics can be held responsible for him.
Guys,
I know you are all hot and bothered about this video rubbish, but no-one has yet mentioned the underlying “Americanism” of it all. I’ve nothing against America (apart from Bush and his friends), but I’m pretty certain that Jesus (if he existed) would have been as indifferent to capitalism as he would be to Marxism.
I imagine that he would scourge the money grabbing tele-evangelists out of the studios – and if the persecution of Christians was ‘real’ he would tell them to suffer it gladly…
Just saying.
Maybe you can help me, here. Have you found a good “saddle soap” for washing away the blood of Christian Children? I swear, I am having such a time. I am about ready just to dye the damn boots red.
Tulse: Which specific statements are you referring to? You might checkthis link for more information, especially this sublink.
Isn’t it illegal to intentionally broadcast lies about people?
By asserting in this video that Richard Dawkins:
“thinks that people who teach their children about God should be arrested”,
aren’t they guilty of committing slander and defamation of character?
If I were Richard’s attorney I would be recommending that he threatens to sue there sorry arses for broadcasting that particular little piece of misinformation.
All hail the moron brigade!
DingoDave:
In the US of A it used to be illegal to libel someone, and actionable to slander someone. With the entire judiciary thoroughly fascist, all sense of propriety is long gone.
Azkyroth,
The zoos remark actually isn’t all that far off, at least for some of us. If Banner didn’t actually mean a literal zoo, but limiting certain kinds of religiousity to a “safe” legal local, such as private life, I’m all for that. There is no reason, other than the practical, to tolerate intolerance.
The goal of Jefferson et. al., was to limit crazy-fundy thought to legal zoos, where they couldn’t harm anyone but the practitioners. Think the Amish – I’m cool with that, since they basically keep their insanity to themselves. Or traditional Orthodox Judaism.
What they’re afraid of is exactly what we want – for them to keep their hands to themselves. Christian fundies, Muslim fundies, etc, should be in legal zoos – they can wear burkhas for all I care, as long as they keep their burkhas away from the rest of us.
That’s worse than death, from their point of view.
Maybe you can help me, here. Have you found a good “saddle soap” for washing away the blood of Christian Children? I swear, I am having such a time. I am about ready just to dye the damn boots red.
Good question!
If you keep your boots highly polished, that blood will not penetrate the leather and cause a stain!
I polish mine with fat rendered from the the Christians I fry up in my Christian Bar-B-Cue and Torture Shack.
Works like a charm!
CRM-114 wrote:
“In the US of A it used to be illegal to libel someone, and actionable to slander someone. With the entire judiciary thoroughly fascist, all sense of propriety is long gone.”
Please tell me you’re joking. Surely there must be some recourse for those who have found themselves to have been libeled or slandered?
The laws are on the books, but whether or not they’re effectively enforced has become a combination popularity contest and highest-bidder auction. (Sadly, that’s far too true of most US laws these days).
Wait… we’re not supposed to be planning to lynch and commit atrocities? But PZ, what am I going to do with all these mutant cyborg cephalopods? I can’t cut their pay – I bred them to kill.
Thanks for letting me know you don’t advocate violence… cheesits.
Azkyroth, I was thinking specifically of statements like these, but further research suggests those may not be accurate. Judging from the actual action of the Nazis, it does look like his beliefs were ambivalent at best, but I’m not sure if any specific statements can be attributed to him.
Ref.#105
What an appalling state of affairs!
That is already the law of the land. It has been in the US constitution for 200+ years, separation of church and state.
No one would give a rat’s ass what these clowns do, think, or say if they would leave everyone else alone. Free country and voluntary ignorance and general looniness is totally legal. The problem is they openly, desperately want to set up a theocracy and head on back to the dark ages.
From their viewpoint, the problem with the Salem witch trials is that they stopped at 26 hangings. By now they could have been up to 26 million or so. Theocracies have a well earned reputation as hells on earth.
We also freebase kittens.
Slander and libel are on the books as civil torts (injuries). So yeah, Dawkins could sue them for lying and calling him a zookeeper wannabe. The problem is, it is a long, expensive convoluted process and most of the time the knuckle walkers don’t have any money to pay a judgement anyway.
Besides which, morons are dime a dozen here. For fringe groups, everyone just shrugs their shoulders and ignores them. It’s not like making up lies and being generally incoherent is going to convince anyone except the already whackoed.
Um, it’s always been that way. And that’s progress – once upon a time the only thing that mattered was the opinion of the person acting as judge.
From a marketing perspective, the video could be counterproductive. Atheists make up such a small % of the belief spectrum, any publicity is likely to be helpful to the atheist cause.
Outside the lies and distortions, the video also associates atheism with reason, rationality, and refers to the bible as a “2000 year old fairy tale”. Is there an address to which we can send donations?
Hitler was a Catholic.
He said so himself over and over again. Xians in general and Catholics in particular have been attempting to rewrite history ever since. Well, duh, what else can they do. Repeating lies over and over doesn’t make them true.
I am by no means a terribly bright person, but I would like to add one small point.
Neither atheists nor the religious have the moral high ground here, as I don’t believe that there is one. Atheists have an internal moral system as well as the religious. We may base our moral system upon different things; but the majority of us, atheist and religious alike don’t rape or murder.
And almost certainly, some do.
If a religious person does rape or murder, I’m sure that they do so because of various reasons, just as an atheist who rapes or murders does.
Bringing up a Hitler or Stalin does not automatically paint ALL of ANYONE as a mass murderer. We all, as INDIVIDUALS, make our choices. These generalisations hurt arguments for both sides. People “change sides” all the time. I’m pretty sure that either way they don’t instantly become different people deep down inside.
Sorry if this is overly simplistic. BTW, I still don’t believe in God. Haven’t raped or murdered anyone. Don’t plan to.
That “Almost certainly, some do.” Was not removed during an edit and should be.
Raven:
You livin’ in the same country? I mean, Jefferson and pals tried to put that in the Constitution, and succeeded insofar as a plain reading is relevant. But Jefferson was in bed with the aristocrats, and that monster Jackson inserted “democracy” into the system, and upended any meaningful plain reading, on top of bringing the Revs and Pastors into the system. And by democracy Jackson meant rule by ignoramuses like himself.
Royal screw-up that we will be paying for until the next revolution. By not putting meaningful democracy in the system up-front (that bastard Hamilton!), we got the democracy of the mob and religious fanatics. It would come one way or another.
I glad to hear it!
Also, very good point usually ignored by the overly-religious. No monopoly on crappy behavior. That’s why everyone has to find a reason to behave. Personally, I behave because I have no desire to rape, pillage, and burn. I certainly hope that my religious friends also lack that desire. I would be afraid if they refrained simply because of fear of retribution from the Big White Dude.
The split between me and Raven in #117 is before “You livin’ in the same country.” Damn not using preview.
Brilliant? That’s a funny word to use for such poor production values. It did kind of inspire me though, that whole Reign of Terror thing is kind of sounding like a good idea. I mean, she makes it sound so cheerful and happy I just want to grab a pitchfork and frolic in the street!
And hey, can someone remind me how many times it says there is no god in Mein Kampf vs how many times it uses the bible to justify hating Jews?
Hey wait… I didn’t get the memo…
We’re supposed to persecute Christians?
Heck, I’d just like to do away with faith-based tax payer expenditures. And maybe teach them to spell… and the basics of logic.
Say, why is that when Christian mouths are moving, I always have flashbacks of “1984” and “doublespeak”? — truth is a lie and lies are “higher truths”. Scary.
“mndarwinist: you need to understand christian logic.”
Actually Christian logic is clearly summed up by the following” Anything really good and somewhat unlikey happens, It’s a miracle and due to god. Anything really bad an somewhat unlikley happens. It has nothing to do with god. Wish I cold get judged that way!
The video is pukeworthy.
The page is funny – look at these so-called blasphemies:
· Jesus never existed (There is not much evidence he did as a real person)
· Jesus is a myth like the ancient heroes and
figureheads of pagan savior cults (goes with the one above)
· Jesus and the New Testament writers were wrong about the timing of Christ’s return (They certainly were, the bible says it will happen within that generation)
· Christianity is responsible for atrocities throughout history (like the inquisition)
· The Bible teaches ridiculous notions such as the sun revolves around the earth, the earth is flat, etc. (They jailed Galileo for contradicting it)
· There is no God–the material universe is all there is. (well, it certainly seems to work that way)
Well, “something larger than themselves”….I suppose that is God or something religious. But a “code of honor” might be the ultimately self-interested “always try to be honest/good/nice/etc, because in the end, acting in the opposite way will catch up to you, as well as making your brain work really hard to maintain the lie”.
And maybe some of this code of honor, or the capacity for it, is actually “evolved in”, because it has survival value, or maybe it is just taught to people when they are young (by parents who have it in their self interest to have well behaved kids) so it becomes “part of them” rather than a conscious thing. But I don’t believe that altruism would exist if it didn’t have an advantage for the individual.
foolsheart.com on The God Who Wasn’t There:
“Plus, we learned that atheists snuck into churches on Easter Sunday to plant this DVD in the hopes that young people would find it and have their faith shaken.”
(Emphasis my own)
SNUCK into churches? As though we have to skulk through the basement door as to not be scorched by hellfire? These people are batshit insane…
Rob,
You’re really trying to stuff too much in one box. No one (sane) doubts that altruism can not be in contravention of self-interest, but that’s a huge distance from saying that it’s determined by self-interest.
I mean, no one doubts that ape’s follow the laws of quantum physics, but that is far from saying that you can deduce the behavior of apes from quantum physics. Morality must go beyond self-interest to be morality in any meaningful sense.
Yes, you can mutter that when I do something nice for a stranger it can be rationalized by my long-term interest in the success of the human race, or some such nonsense. But the truth of the matter is I do it out of love; no one is really, consistently kind out of self-interest, but out of empathy. Of course, empathy has biological survival value to some degree – but possibly much less than we see in practice, since it’s evolutionary value would be in terms of primitive communities and not modern societies.
We are moral because we have feelings of love and solidarity. Of course, suicidal self-denigrating self-effacing love doesn’t drive most people’s morality. But there’s a huge conceptual space between that and the automated, self-interested CEO style of amorality you describe as the basis of morality.
Didn’t you have a mother Rob? Do you really think her love was mostly driven by some kind of “enlightened self-interest,” that she was a little CEO maximizing her genetic and social profit? The fact that she may have loved you doesn’t mean she had to be ignorant of her self-interest, just not driven solely by self-interest.
It was a bishop who first said, “Kill them all. Let God sort them out” (actually, “God will know his own”), in ordering the massacre of a town of about 20,000 people of whome perhaps 10% were Cathars, i.e. egalitarian Christians who believed that women were as good as men, common were as good as noble, and poor were as good as rich — because if you were one in this life, you’d likely be the other in the next life.
Oh, yes, and they set up the Inquisition to deal with them.
Sorry, the Catholics set up the inquisition to deal with the Cathars and their “Albigensian heresy.” Incidentally, the Tour de France went through the town of Albi, where Albigensians come from, the other day. The bishop’s palace looks like a fort.
Oh, by the way did anyone see the paper about altruistic behavior in rats? Apparently if you’re nice to them they’ll be nice to strange rats and push the lever that gets the other rat some food. Who knew that rats could read the bible?
Was that Dembski doing the voice in falsetto? Or, just a half-octave higher?
You know what other thing those nasty atheist communist russians did? They sent a woman into space (before the yanks)! Everyone knows that women are supposed to be baking brownies for the church social, not flying into space…
With regard to Dawkins’s statement:
“…nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”
…I disagree with his phrasing. “Blind,” “pitiless,” and “indifference” are words laden with human emotion. The universe is not blind, pitiless, or indifferent. It exists. Period.
The use of such terminology enables the construction of strawmen, as does, for example, discussion of “belief” in the validity of biological evolution, or use of the term ‘Darwinism’. As has been stated before, the fact that biological evolution occurs is as well-established as a fact can be, and there’s no such thing as a philosophy called Darwinism. There is such a thing as a scientific discipline called biology.
What the Id-ists, et al. don’t realize, or won’t admit, is that, were there the slightest shred of evidence for their contentions, natural scientists all over the world would immediately turn their attention to that fascinating new development.
Well, this veered a bit off-topic, but, on the other hand, the subjects are intertwined, especially in the U.S.
If anyone hasn’t seen the video and wishes to have their week ruined, its up on
YouTube … The “agent for God” who uploaded it has plenty of other videos recorded in defense of his omnipotent friend … who is so frail that he would perish under the light of reason.
… but only if seen through the eyes of a reasoned mind ;-)
I’m still keeping Heinlein’s aphorism on my top ten list, “Natural laws have no pity.”
It does not possess sight. It does not possess pity. It does not distinguish between the possible outcomes.
Dawkins statement is quite literally correct. You are not.
Re: #63 “… For some reason I picture a cute little ‘LOL-meme’ kitten in full Nazi regalia (with or without mittens) and the caption “GOTT MITUNZ?”
Great idea, Scotty B!
Heh. I did just that. Picked Best Kitler #7 and added the caption “Gott MittUns?” (yeah, I know it’s “Mit,” but it didn’t read right).
I’d upload it, but the means escapes me. Y’all use your imaginations.
— CV
It’s not dislike. It’s the simple fact that quicktime has never worked right on anything but a mac. On any other kind of box, quicktime is like a slot machine; sometimes it works wonderfully, and sometimes it just doesn’t deliver. I don’t own a mac, and quicktime isn’t enough reason to buy one.
The thing about the “The fool hath said in his heart, ‘there is no God.'” verse is that a couple lines after that there is the “there is none that doeth good, no, not one” verse, and it’s referring to everybody on the planet. You hear the fundies quoting the “fool in his heart” line all the time, but you never hear them quote the “none that doeth good” line.
Of course if they ever heard an atheist say there are none that doeth good they would jump all over that and say that atheists have such a bleak outlook on life. But when Jesus says it, then it’s perfectly okay. Yet they would never accuse Jesus of being an atheist. Oh, the irony. Atheist put people in hell forever? Bad bad atheist! Jesus put people in hell forever? Nice Jesus! Happy happy nice Jesus!!
Those who are ignorant of history, as the author of such a ridiculous notion as, [Robespierre] . . . “also like to kill people who disagreed with him,” apparently are doomed to endlessly rewrite it, as the times demand.
Haven’t we seen this movie before?
Caledonian,
With regard to my comment, and your response:
Me: “The universe is not blind, pitiless, or indifferent.”
You:
“It does not possess sight. It does not possess pity. It does not distinguish between the possible outcomes.
Dawkins statement is quite literally correct. You are not.”
The universe (aka physical world) possesses nothing, so it’s meaningless to talk about what it doesn’t possess. The idea of possession is also a human construct.
t’s not dislike. It’s the simple fact that quicktime has never worked right on anything but a mac.
Oh quicktime works just fine evrywhere… so long as you don’t use Quicktime (TM) to play them!
Back in the days of my naive, idealistic youth I used to assume that pretty much everyone was doing the right thing. I wasn’t sure that I agreed with their religious teachings, but I figured that preachers were in the business because they sincerely believed and wanted to help others. It didn’t occur to me that some might just enjoy having power and authority.
I still expect that most do want to do good, but a rather off-kilter set of values centred on some hypothesized “soul” combined with the power of rationalization seems to let “good” slip into some troubling places. And then there’s a substantial portion who just don’t seem to care. It’s been linked recently in comments and on the front page here, but William Lobdell’s piece for the LA Times about his experiences covering religion comes to mind here.
It doesn’t seem the most outrageous deed described, but Father Uribe’s vow of poverty as a defense against child support stays with me as an example of arrogant heartlessness. Apparently even God up in the sky with his big stick can’t convince that man to lift a finger for his child. Once you’ve exercised your sacred right to life by being born, I guess you just don’t matter any more.
Naturally, many and probably most believers have rather more decency than that, but faith all too often does an end-run around their morality as they stand by their religion and its authorities.
They want readers to pray that god will provide the men and money to get the message out. Then they ask for donations. Let god foot the bill.
Really? Doesn’t it have a lot of mass, and volume, and stuff? It also seems to have the properties of more-or-less following scientific models, suggesting that it has some sort of order and follows certain laws. In that case, I should think that we could say that these define properties of the universe.
Note that I’m not about to wade into the uncharted (to me waters of philosophy to treat seriously the question of whether the universe necessarily must obey some unknown laws just because our models provide good approximations of its behaviour, but hopefully I can get by here naively supposing that the universe probably does. I’m not sure I can really get anywhere philosophically on such a matter other than tightening up how I express myself, though that doesn’t hurt.
More practically, people are often in danger of trying to anthromorphize pretty much everything they see. The question has been raised of whether theism is applying that tendency to the universe. It does seem to be nearly stated in some discourse I’ve heard from less traditional believers who’ve moved away from fire and brimstone. In any case, it’s all too easy to imagine that the universe cares about things, as one can see by observing those poor saps who really seem to believe in The Secret. I think that Dawkins’ quote is meant to communicate that the universe, overall, is not run by some kindly (or vengeful) bearded old man and is not Chopra’s silly “mind field”. Although certain beings within it might be said to care about things, it doesn’t show any signs of thinking like a human at all, not even caring about your local football team.
I think it was read by Michelle Bachmann. Sounds cheerleady (cheerlady?) enough.
SNUCK into churches? As though we have to skulk through the basement door as to not be scorched by hellfire?
Don’t knock sneaking into churches. It’s more fun than just walking in. My friends and I would do it all the time in Winona (church on every block) and explore. Great architecture – I got up into the dome of St. Stanislaus once (nooks full of dust and dead bat carcasses). The idea of being caught (no, we never vandalized or stole anything, Ms. Chirpy Voice) made it all the more fun. It’s romantic, too. XXXXOOOO We left little notes written on pieces of paper about God not existing stuck in the hymnals. Ah, those were the days.
In my life, I have made only one prayer: “O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.” And it was done.
Okay, here are two interesting things.
1. Robespierre in fact attacked ATHEIST groups, such as the party of Jacques Hebert, an atheist thinker so started a cult to Reason, and started the Cult of the Supreme Being, which was deistic and made Robespierre a “god”; he created a huge float in the shape of a mountain and had himself on top to seem like Moses. Hence, this is a case of THEISTS attacking ATHEISTS, not the other way around.
2. Hitler was a Christian. Worse yet, as pointed out by Richard Carrier in the “German Studies Review” , Oct. 2003, he showed that the only phrases attributed to Hitler that were anti-Christian or anti-religious were FORGED by a French-speaking Swiss-man, to which others simply copied and translated uncritically. Besides, was not the Nazi slogan on their belts and the like “Gott Mit Uns”, “God with us”. And where to you think antisemitism came from? Atheism? Just read the gospels without blinders: the Jewish mob saying “his blood be upon us”, plus the Vatican only after WWII said all Jews were not actually guilty of deicide.
As for communism, that can easily be called state worship in replacement of divine worship. And at least you believe that when you die the suffering is over, not just beginning.
Maybe next time they should do some research before they make crap propaganda?
Thank god for this publicity!
By the way, Robespierre’s downfall started with his declaration of a national “Festival of the Supreme Being,” where he used words like:
So anyone who mixes religious and nationalistic rhetoric, or declares a national day of worship, likes to kill people who disagree with him?
Not to defend apple (trust me, I hate their crappy products every bit as much as microsofts, I’m just not forced to use them as often) or anything, but quicktime files run fine on Linux. The only time they’re annoying is when they’re embedded in webpages. If you have trouble playing them when downloaded you really should look into a better video player. Or better yet, a better operating system. Perhaps even one that doesn’t lead you to believe that their bundled video player is the beginning and end of the category.
I think you also over-stepped the truth a bit there by implying that the quicktime player works right on mac either. It’s still an annoying pos. The value of it extends from its smooth seek to its smooth seek and not a step further, on any platform.
To Kristine,
Leaving little notes in the hymnals probably does count as vandalism, and the act of entering the building itself (your post implies that there was not an easily accessible open door, if all you did was enter and explore past what some may veiw were acceptable areas, given that none were posted as private, I apologize) was at least illegal entry, if not breaking and entering.
Not a great role model for the furthurance of rational thought.
Sounds quite a bit like a good old time for a teen-ager just kicking around looking for (relatively) harmless mischief.
Cheers,
autumn
A friend and I climbed once in the window of a church so we could try playing the organ. We did. We also went up to the belfry. It was like Heaven! It was bright and airy. It was shiny and white! Yes! It was all covered in white just like the clouds and angels and archways in all those photographs of Heaven you see everywhere. The view was tremendous. I felt closer to God. Then I relized what all that white stuff really was.
We left no notes.
Unfortunately that was enough to win G. W. Bush two elections.
Say! Does anyone here know where this atheist can get herself a burqa?
Janine
I like the way these people see atheism as a threat not to religion in general, but specifically to Christianity. As such, atheism is associated with Islam in their minds. And they assume that anyone reached by their message will feel that Islam is not at all similar to their own faith…
Janine,
To protect yourself from the pigeon droppings in the belfrey, I presume?
Autumn,
Don’t be silly. I am using my godlessness to pave the path for allah. So I need to dress properly for when allah shows up.
snort
Re #9:
Instead of theist Robespierre, American Vision should be attacking real French atheists like Baron d’Holbach. Of course d’Holbach didn’t kill anyone so that might undermine their position. But his books were burned by the ancient regime of xian French kings.
“If we go back to the beginnings of things, we shall always find that ignorance and fear created the gods; that imagination, rapture and deception embellished them; that weakness worships them; that custom spares them; and that tyranny favors them in order to profit from the blindness of men.”
(Paul-Henri, baron d’Holbach / 1723-1789 / System of Nature / 1770)
RichStage,
It has been years since I have read that novel but if I remember correctly, some of the androids did show empathy. That includes a automated taxi. Meanwhile, humans were programming themselves with the use of the Penfield Mood Organ. They just choose what emotions they would feel instead of reacting to the outside world like a normal organism.
Coming to this a little late but any excuse for some Derek & Clive –
http://www.phespirit.info/derekandclive/ad_nauseam_03.htm
CLIVE: I-, I was watching that ‘Holocaust’ thing, you know, where-, that story about, er, …..
DEREK: (sniggers)
CLIVE: ….. about Hitler and Him-
DEREK: Yeah, what a c**t he was!
CLIVE: Well, he-, yeah …..
DEREK: Ohhhhh, I didn’t want to know, he’s a c**t!
CLIVE: He’s horrible.
DEREK: Yeah, f****n’-, f*****g …..
CLIVE: And he, you know, he formed this dislike of-, for some reason, probably psychological, for, er, the Jews.
DEREK: Yeah.
CLIVE: And the story was on Holocaust how, er, you know, they all got wiped out and, er, …..
DEREK: Mm.
CLIVE: ….. put in gas ovens and stuff like that. And I was very influenced by that ’cause, er, Michael Moriaty was very good as that, er, Nazi.
DEREK: Mmm.
CLIVE: And, as soon as I switched off the third episode I, er, got on, er, got on a number 18 …..
DEREK: Mmm.
CLIVE: ….. and got up to Golders Green and I must have-, I must have slaughtered about eighteen thousand before I realised, you know, what I was doing …..
DEREK: Mmm.
CLIVE: ….. I thought, ‘the f*****g television has driven me to this’.
I love how when the Christian apologists mention the French revolution they just accidentaly fail to mention the bands of roving Christian aristocrats out killing every Jacobean they could see. Or the Christian lead white terror that began after the execution of Robspierre. Or the fact that Robspierre was a deist, and executed his atheist supporters over his belief.
The one lesson about the French revolution is that there were no good guys, only shades of grey, most of which were very dark.
See, Robespierre was a Deist, not a Christian, and every good Christian knows that only the Christian God exists.
Therefore, Robespierre was an atheist ;)
The fact that he also executed suspected atheists just goes to show how horrible atheists are even to each other.
“As I understand it, he was raised Catholic, but he made many statements during the Third Reich that seem pretty explicitly anti-Christian, and many in the Nazi hierarchy, himself included, had a deep interest in the occult, incorporating much of symbology and rituals into Nazism.”
That does not sound anti-Catholic in any way.
“Judging from the actual action of the Nazis, it does look like his beliefs were ambivalent at best,”
Again, that doesn’t make him not-Catholic. Many Catholics are “ambivalent at best” about the teachings of the Catholic church. However, that doesn’t make them atheists.
No, Hitler was not a bible thumping Southern Baptist fundy. But there is a long way from that to atheist. The question is, did he believe in God? Saying that he had an interest in the occult does not address this point in any way.
The images juxtaposed with the “blind, pitiless indifference” quote would seem to prove Dawkins’ point if anything. Yes, fundies, there is evil in the world, and the universe does nothing about it. Salvation is not sent from on high no matter how bad it gets. As Hitchens would say, it’s a problem for you, not for us.
Am I the only one who found the colour scheme on their website equally disturbing?
The video on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzEPCHH2yB4
Sheesh, you’d think you people had never heard of islamo-atheism.
I just want to know why so many highly intelligent men, mainly scientists and historians and such, have combovers. They may be smart, but not very wise.
I just don’t get it. Christianity and atheism are both statements about the nature of reality. Why do moral consequences even matter, not that I think they really make sense as discussed? If there is no god, which I think is true, why does it matter what moral consequences this might have? It being better for people (if I thought it did) wouldn’t make it true.
frog said:
Sorry, but yes, I think she was programmed by evolution as well as her upbringing to behave that way. We call it “love”, but it isn’t mystical, it is simply biological. And yes it has self interest (especially in the Darwinian sense…i.e. the perpetuation of her genes) strongly behind it, even if it is subconscious.
Anything else is a mystical explanation, and I just don’t buy that.
#161:
See, Robespierre was a Deist, not a Christian, and every good Christian knows that only the Christian God exists.
Therefore, Robespierre was an atheist
Well, that’s only because he was French. Everyone knows that the American Deists (most of the Founding Fathers) were actually Pentacostal Southern Baptists.
Egnor’s meat bashing has gone too far!
This is my favorite anti-atheist store. I especially enjoy the thong.
carolyn, “I just don’t get it. Christianity and atheism are both statements about the nature of reality.”
False, xianity has nothing whatsoever to do with reality; it is like believing a video game about reality. Here is another quote from Baron d’Holbach.
“All children are atheists – they have no idea of God.”
(Paul-Henri, baron d’Holbach / 1723-1789)
If we take the claim that atheism results in evil seriously what does it say about Christianity that Marx, Engels, Stalin and a boatload more of the bad guys were lapsed Christians? Especially Stalin and presumably most of the rest of the Soviets involved in mass murder and other violations of human rights. Of course the “sin” of Marx and Engels was merely creating Communism, and they had no role in the atrocities commited in their names.
He seems to have had a sincere belief in something he called “Providence”, which he credited with his repeated close escapes from assassination attempts and death in WWI (and possibly for his amazing rise to power from total obscurity).
More problematically, the Catholic church believed in Hitler. When he took office in 1933, all other national governments found his thuggishness too intolerable and in effect placed Germany under an informal diplomatic embargo. This was eventually broken by a sweetheart deal involving a special “Concordat” with the Vatican, which not only gave Hitler a major popular boost when he needed it, but also dissolved the Catholic “Centrum” party, his only surviving organized opposition.
“So without God holding them back, *they* would be raping, pillaging, ethnic cleansing, etc? I guess that explains it…” — Posted by: Madam Pomfrey
I’m reminded of…
“Are you telling me that the only reason you don’t steal and rape and murder is that you’re frightened of God?” — Richard Dawkins, The Root Of All Evil?