"Of course, this is only one viewpoint, others may differ, and are equally valid."
We atheists do not state that other viewpoints are just as valid, because they're not.

:-D This can so easily become yet another science vs religion debate. Why don't we call a truce on this thread and discuss National Cleavage Day instead?

@santosh

I'll 2nd that.

Seriously, why was this not better advertised?

"Today is Palm Sunday....on Friday we mourn the death of the greatest man to walk the Earth. Though He was both God and yet man.
For those of you who do not realize the sheer magnitude of God's Love and sacrifice through this gesture of Grace, I would like for you to go out, purchase a Bible, and read the whole thing." - If anyone actually listened to that advice it would be the best April Fools joke ever.

No, KA is right. We should celebrate this day, a great man died. And now because of his sacrifice I get Friday and Monday off uni.

Lack of religious toleration... seems things haven't changed here at all?
to the Christians: we should not be trying to force our religion on other people, we can suggest, we can spread the word of god, but we should not force anything upon them.
To the Atheists/Non-Christians: We would truly appreciate if you did not insult and belittle our religion. some of us truly believe in the lord and savior, and although many of us do not have a problem with the fact that you do not believe what we believe, we would ask that you do not try to insult our religion with rude comments.
Sincerely- a Christian who just wants to see Religious Tolerance.

"We atheists do not state that other viewpoints are just as valid, because they're not. "

@santosh, I know you don't, and neither do I, as a Christian. I was complaining that abge was demanding it of OP when he doesn't do it himself.

@semck

The difference is that I don't threaten to kill people who disagree with me. atom does.

^

Militant theists? They fly planes into buildings, or light people on fire, or blow up abortion clinics, or set bombs at the Olympics.

Militant atheists? They might mock you a little bit on the interwebs.

Bit of a difference.

@abge, So you've said since my post, but he didn't here. If we're trying to make the forums more friendly for newcomers, would it be too much to ask that posts not implicitly assume knowledge of a long background, without in any way explicitly referring to it? To a newcomer (and to me) it looks like KA suggests a book and celebrates a key week in our religion, and you jump on him for "demanding [you] conform to [his] beliefs" and "not acknowledging other viewpoints exist." If you're looking to keep alive some old feud, try to make that clearer.

No, I will not simply forget the things people have said just for convenience sake, especially when their opinions haven't seemed to change at all.

I would also like to point out that I had started this discussion by suggesting a book to atom in return for his recommendation. Only after Draug jumped down my throat did I bring up old dirt against atom.

Two lines - nay two sentences! - is jumping down your throat? Sensitive much?

lol

I hardly think I'm being the sensitive one here.

KA put an idea out there, and Abe responded, respectfully, with his own opinion. We don't have segregated threads on this site. Christians don't get to have Christian only threads and Atheists don't get to have atheist only threads.

So I guess I'm the only one pushing for Religious toleration around here?

Define toleration. Is disagreeing being intolerant?

@butterhead

Other than my 1), which was clearly in jest, what did I say that was intolerant. atom asked me to read a book, and I asked him to read a book.

Well Jack here is an example of another of your militant theists:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9_and_Magda_Trocm%C3%A9

If you can't find anything to criticise in them and the lives they led, then perhaps they were mad or, at the very least, delusional? Whatever as long as it fits your stereotype eh?

@ abge, given your shouting down of any view that does not accord with your own, I do hope that you will consider your role should this forum become moderated. We wouldn't want to see you having to cramp your ''style'', would we?

no disagreeing is not being intolerant. but insulting each others religions(or lack there of) because it isn't what you believe is. I believe in god. If you don't that is fine, if you think it is a load of crap, I would disagree, but It is your opinion. all I want is for everyone to accept each other and there beliefs, and not sit around and insult the beliefs of others.

@Abge- wasn't really directed towards you as much as people that were going off about believing in "garbage" and "Lets all take a moment to remember all the human bonfires that Christians started.

Or the innocent firstborn sons that your God slaughtered.

Or the civilians of Jericho that he commanded his chosen people to butcher.

Even if your God was real, I'd never bow down before anything that fucked up. Thankfully, he's made up, like every other deity.

Mankind will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest. " that is very intolerant of Christianity.

An example of militant atheism -

Article 20 of the 1976 Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea guaranteed religious freedom, but it also declared that "all reactionary religions that are detrimental to Democratic Kampuchea and the Kampuchean People are strictly forbidden." About 85 percent of the population follows the Theravada school of Buddhism. The country's 40,000 to 60,000 Buddhist monks, regarded by the regime as social parasites, were defrocked and forced into labour brigades.

Many monks were executed; temples and pagodas were destroyed or turned into storehouses or gaols. Images of the Buddha were defaced and dumped into rivers and lakes. People who were discovered praying or expressing religious sentiments were often killed. The Christian and Muslim communities also were even more persecuted, as they were labelled as part of a pro-Western cosmopolitan sphere, hindering Cambodian culture and society.

The Roman Catholic cathedral of Phnom Penh was completely razed. The Khmer Rouge forced Muslims to eat pork, which they regard as forbidden (ḥarām). Many of those who refused were killed. Christian clergy and Muslim imams were executed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_Rouge_rule_of_Cambodia#Religious_communities

Actually, abge, sensitive is exactly what you're being. And an important correction:

"I would also like to point out that I had started this discussion by suggesting a book to atom in return for his recommendation. Only after Draug jumped down my throat did I bring up old dirt against atom."

No, only after I complained about your response to Draug/atom did you bring up old dirt. You didn't bring it up at all at the former point -- you just complained petulantly about today's post, whatever you now claim your motivation was.

@ semck. I too read that it was a disingenuous recomendation at best and an insult at worse. It is a shame that he hasn't got the honesty to admit it.

@semck

I see no point in continuing this conversation. Congratulations, I guess, for outlasting me.

I suggested a book for atom to read. Everything that happened beyond that was in response to people criticizing me for responding to a post that was directed towards me.

Fulhamish:

I would take the position that the Khmer Rouge were as much True Believers as any theist.

Anytime you get a divorce from reality that cannot be held up and examined objectively, there are issues.

Plus, even among actual communists, the Khmer Rouge don't have a really good reputation. :) (Although given a shot, I'm sure Putin would carry water for them)

Also re: entrails comment.... I was demonstrating with a quote from Diderot that what Abge said wasn't really bad, and I was being deliberately inflammatory.

I thought I made that clear with my follow on commentary.

<Ohhhhh Abge....Fortknox....psssssst.... /\ Hate speech....how about you start sending Jackie-boy private messages. He's using intentionally inflamatory comments to make a point.

Oh....wait....THAT'S RIGHT....he's insulting people with religion, and it's perfectly acceptable to bach and hate on the religious. what was I thinking?? lol I love the hypocrisy on this site....

@ Jack ''I would take the position that the Khmer Rouge were as much True Believers as any theist.''

I thoroughly agree militant atheism is of itself a belief system. Often substituting a belief in the all encompassing explanatory power of the theory of natural selection or, as I prefer to call it, the religion of evolutionism.
As to atheism amongst communists the apple never falls far from the tree. This from Stalin himself in preparation for the implementation of the Great Turn:
"What has happened is to a certain extent the same manoeuvre (with corresponding reservations, of course) as took place in 1921, when, in view of the famine in the country, the Party led by Lenin raised the question of removing valuables from churches for the purpose of acquiring grain for the famine-stricken regions, basing a large-scale anti-religious campaign on tins, and when the priests, hanging on to the valuables, spoke out against the starving masses and thereby aroused the anger of the masses against the church in general, against religious superstition, in particular, and especially against priests and their leader. There were some cranks in our party then who thought that Lenin only began to understand the need for a struggle against the church in 1921 (laughter), and not before then. This is ridiculous, of course, comrades. Of course, Lenin understood the need for a struggle against the church before 1921 as well. But this is not the point. The point is to link a broad, large-scale anti-religious campaign with the vital interests of the masses, so that it, this campaign, is supported by the masses".
J.Stalin. 0 rabotakh aprel'skogo ob'edinennogo plenuma TsK i TsKK. Gosizdat. 1928, pp. 28-30.

In my view militant atheism has at least as much blood on its hands as religious fundamentalism, partuicularly in the context of the last century, perhaps the most barbaric period in human history.

@ abge the moderator/@ abge the contributor (take your pick)

''I suggested a book for atom to read. Everything that happened beyond that was in response to people criticizing me for responding to a post that was directed towards me. ''

Well actually that is a distortion/lie of the first order. When someone suggested picking up the Bible at Easter here were your first words on the matter -

''1) I'm confused, because Harrison Ford isn't dead yet.''

Doesn't help your case much does it?

Yeah. I doubt the Khmer Rouge were militant "believers" in natural selection.

The True Belief I was referring to was Marxism-Leninism.


But nice try. Trying to equal bronze age superstition with scientific thought backed by overwhelming evidence is amusing.