Homestar Runner Wiki Forum

As per furrykef's request I'm going to try and move the argument that started in Racerx's thread to here.

For reference, it started with this post by 'Seriously.' and continues down. This new thread starts with my response to his post here.





Here's the deal. In your first post, you claimed religions are mockeries of accountability, science, and common sense, "and so on." Now, the dictionary definition of "delusion" is a false belief strongly held to in spite of invalidating evidence--since it was obvious that you think science has invalidated religious belief, and that religious belief goes against accountability and common sense, it's implied through definition that you think religious people are delusional. Such a claim is insulting to me, and I would imagine any other religious person--especially people like Didymus who are quite well-read in logic and reason. QED.

I've been demonstrating that such views are hallmarks of intolerance, as well as arrogance and elitism, because it implies that atheists and other non-theist people have a monopoly on reason, intelligence, and so on. In response you state that there are people who would agree with what you initially said about religions. People like you with such beliefs are intolerant of religion, unwilling to think that religious people or religions themselves might have just as equal claims to common sense, rationality, intelligence, and the like.

Yet this argument drags on and on--you say you agree with the idea of religious tolerance, yet you keep pushing this view. That's why I call you desperate. You're incredibly determined (yet another dictionary definition of the word) to justify this view. (And if I said nothing of it here, I'd expect you to take that logic and claim I am equally desperate to defend religion. If I'm desperate of something, it'd be to sow religious tolerance in the mind of someone who's entrenched in an arrogant, elitist belief.)



Let's take corporate America for an example. What about Bill Gates and Ted Turner? They're pretty much atheists--well, Ted Turner can't make up his mind whether or not he's Christian or atheist, so I guess he doesn't count.



You do realize that at the time this nation was founded and this nation's framework, many of the Founding Fathers were not Christian? Many were deists. Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine ... George Washington is disputed as to whether ot not he was Deist. John Adams was a Unitarian. If you're claiming my point is baseless because the country's government, constitution, and the supreme court were founded on "Christian values," I'd say you need to take a closer look at the groundwork.



I don't know, if the politican's religion has scriptures that extol doing good and loving your fellow man, I'd think that'd only help the issue.

As it stands however, politics often disregard a logical or rational approach to problems, so such a point is moot anyhow. There was a study conducted on both democrats and republicans. http://www.livescience.com/othernews/06 ... sions.html



That you think literal-interpreting Christians would try to "move armegeddon along" if they were in power tells me a lot about what you know of Christianity and the Bible. I think it's safe to assume by your comment that you think the book of Revelations kicks off with a catostrophic final battle. It doesn't; the end times, as it were, starts with some rather UN-natural omens and catastrophes.

In short, it would take an absolute sociopath to use "moving Armegeddon along" for justification to start any sort of war!

Besides, trying to globally slaughter all of mankind in a nuclear holocaust goes against a number of basic Christian values. Religious leaders like Pope John Paul II never advocated a nuclear war--or a war of any kind--for the sole purpose of "moving Armegeddon along." Heck, PJP2 spoke out against the invasion of Iraq.



That's not the point, but it's my fault for not clarifying it, so I'll try again.

I don't expect people--even all other Christians--to agree with my interpretation. Some do, some don't, and that's okay, because it wasn't my aim to convince people it's the one true interpretation of the one true religion. What it demonstrates that Christian beliefs aren't necessarily the bane of science. It's a demonstration that it's possible for a Christian to reconcile his beliefs. That you yourself are not a Christian has no bearing on the demonstration, especially since such a demonstration wasn't made in an attempt to convert or convince people that Christianity is the one true religion, just that it's not the foe of science some claim it is.



Not really. For example, the Protestant Reformation--Martin Luther tried to remove several books from the Protestant version of the Bible, including Revelations, because they went against the Protestant concept of "faith alone." What is considered canonical and acrophyical was highly debated over the centuries. There have been, and continue to be, differing schools of thought.

So that whole blurb about making up what we desire was referring to the disagreements over what is canon and what's not? That isn't what I saw at all. Which of course leads me to your claims of hypocrisy ...



Hypocrisy, huh? Gross misrepresentation? I don't think so. You didn't literally say "making it up whenever you want" but it's rather clear to me what you think and what you mean by what I've quoted. I can't be ashamed of my hypocrisy when it never actually happened.

That said, it's funny how you make accusations and then dismiss rebuttals to them as "mere excuses," or rather, do the textual equivalent of putting your fingers in your ears and trying to drown out the people talking to you by saying "I'm not a Christian so it doesn't matter!" Well, apparently it matters enough for you to make accusations about a given religion, so it should matter enough that you listen to responses demonstrating why those accusations can't hold water!



Hey, if you're going to get petty and say that is "not helping my argument," then just remember that subtle jabs at my typos or misspelled words aren't going to aid yours either! You still understood what I meant.



"Making myself out to be a saint?" How'd you get that from arguing that I don't have a "lower standard of respect" in regard to atheists like you claim I am? Are you thinking that by asserting I have no prejudice towards atheists, instead taking issue with people (of any religion) who are intolerant of other religions, that I think myself a pure and innocent human being? Are you saying that for me to be a normal human being, I have to look down my nose at atheists?

I call Gorbachev a great atheist because he defends people's freedom of religious thought, and I'm pretty sure I've said that before. I'd have the same respect for anyone, of any religion, who did the same. There's more to it though: when he was Priemer, he tried to sow tolerance and openness in the Soviet Union, as opposed to all before him. When the Soviet Union dissolved, he spearheaded the religious freedom movement.



Heh! Another accusation of making excuses.

So let me get this straight--it's not an excuse for you to dismiss atheist persecution as being perpetrated by "poor atheists," yet if I say that Christian persecution is perpetrated by "poor Christians" that don't follow what Jesus taught, it's an excuse?

Mind telling me why your response doesn't qualify as an excuse while mine does?

Or is it just a cheap cop-out for you to claim my response is an excuse, so you don't have to own up to the fact that people are people, and no matter what they believe--theism, atheism, whatever--they are all equally capable of doing harm?

Furthermore, you've yet to name specific people! All you do is vaguely talk about "popes" and "emperors" and "church officials" who do this or do that, but never actually bother to mention names or specific events. Meanwhile, I've named specific atheist groups and people who have persecuted others, and specific events in which it happened.

How am I supposed to take your responses seriously if you give me nothing but vagaries?



Like I said, how am I supposed to know who you're talking about? You've given me nothing solid here. For all I know, everything you're talking about, you've learned from hearsay.



As I've experienced first hand from people who "bottle it up," people who harbor hate or disgust for religious people let it influence their actions and behavior--you're still intolerant if you put religious people on a lower pedistal, as you are by continually trying to justify this idea of yours that religions are mockeries of anything dealing with logic and reason. I would still be intolerant if I thought lowly of atheists by default, but I don't.



Are you once again trying to assert that atheists and non-theists are smarter than religious people? Because I'm pretty sure you knew what I meant by "beliefs."

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Wow. Lol. I wish I could post as well as that, Trev-Mun. I agree with you on all accounts, and I am pretty tired of being bashed by Atheists who constitute "not being stupid enough to believe in fairy tales," as "proof." Well spoken, and nice 'n' lengthy.

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