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God?

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  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    This is where you've had you moral intuitions completely destroyed. You think the response to the killing of innocent civilians - for this is what the embassy workers were - due to a free press in a secular and democratic nation publishing a cartoon, is to call for the murderers to 'lighten up'? You think a cartoon is a provocation to murder? You've lost your moral marbles.

    Let's just jump in with both feet eh? Much easier.

    I was referring to the Jerry Springer opera. The death of those that died in the riots about the cartoon is inexcusable. But to knock Islam in general for it is also inexcusable. By all means attack those responsible for the deaths and violence (in fact I'd join you) but the generalisations that New Atheism is so fond of is never going to be a good thing and is simply lazy.

    In any case I would still say that those 'offended' by the cartoons ought to have lightened up. It was designed to provoke a reaction and they played right in to the artist's plans. The better option would have been to retain a dignified silence.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    If I'm understanding this correctly, I have made a particular choice about my life and if you (or anyone) disagrees with it because you think the idea of it is silly/far fetched/ ridiculous/whatever then you feel justified in publicly ridiculing/mocking/verbally attacking me for it?

    That's not a trick question, I just want to see if I have the general gist of it. Not judging or anything, it's a free world etc.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    What criteria have to be met before you start to entertain the notion that Islam may be a less than perfect ideology to indoctrinate people with if you want to live in a world in which human wellbeing is maximised? If I were to describe an unnamed country whose unnamed religious text inspired a society in which to be a woman means to wear a cloth bag and to not be able to drive and to risk being shot for the crime of learning to read, you’d rightly tell me that sounds like an abysmal place to live. You give that place its name: Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia or Iraq and suddenly the barriers come up. I believe that the ideology you hold affects the actions you take. And why we have to pretend that demonstrably barbaric acts are are not a result of following the content of Iron Age texts - as the perpetrators themselves gleefully tell us on video and in print - is utterly beyond me.

    I’m not against religions, per se. I’m against bad ideology that leads to suffering. And religion, both in the past and present, fulfils that criteria.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    What criteria have to be met before you start to entertain the notion that Islam may be a less than perfect ideology to indoctrinate people with if you want to live in a world in which human wellbeing is maximised? If I were to describe an unnamed country whose unnamed religious text inspired a society in which to be a woman means to wear a cloth bag and to not be able to drive and to risk being shot for the crime of learning to read, you?d rightly tell me that sounds like an abysmal place to live. You give that place its name: Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia or Iraq and suddenly the barriers come up. I believe that the ideology you hold affects the actions you take. And why we have to pretend that demonstrably barbaric acts are are not a result of following the content of Iron Age texts - as the perpetrators themselves gleefully tell us on video and in print - is utterly beyond me.

    I?m not against religions, per se. I?m against bad ideology that leads to suffering. And religion, both in the past and present, fulfils that criteria.

    That sort of criticism I can get along with, although I disagree with the sentiment. Religion *can* fulfill that criteria but so can bad politics etc.

    My understanding is that Islam gets such a bad name due to it being prevalent in third-world and developing countries that have always had a broken and often-considered barbaric and lawless society. Britain, on the whole is free from such extremism on such a large scale. My 3 years living in Leicester taught me that the vast majority of Islamics had a live and let live attitude. Nobody tried to convert me, give me hassle or threaten a jihad on my lily-white arse.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    As an addition to the above, I guess I could have had every right to expect hassle from them - I moved there to live with my British-Indian OH. If I paid attention to the Daily Mail, The Sun etc then I should have expected them to be stoning us in the street as many extreme Muslims hate to see "one of their own" with a white man, and believe me as she's a hottie (wayyyy out of my league, no idea how I managed it but that's another story - if you've seen the episode of Scrubs in the final series where Ted gets a girlfriend you'll have some idea) I loved showing her off. Holding her hand in public, grabbing her for a snog (basically acting like we were 20 years younger) etc but we had no shit from any of them. OK perhaps disapproving looks from people who (rightly) thought we should be acting our ages (both mid-30s) but if Islam is such a blood-thirsty religion with barbaric followers then either they avoided living in Leicester or they showed incredible restraint, something they don't seem to do in other parts of the world.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Bear in mind many Muslim nations, including the Ottoman empire, were very enlightened and progressive (relatively speaking) at one point.

    Certainly the 20th century and the oil rush hasn't been kind to the middle east.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Shit, my ADHD meds have sure kicked in!

    If someone's criticism is that a particular religion has been slow in adapting to the times then I'd agree there's a valid case for that. Again I can only speak with any kind of authority about Christianity so that's what I'll focus on: our lot may well have been slow to adapt however this has changed in the past few decades. OK I'll agree that any change has been slow but there is a definite 'revolution' going on. Some denominations are rigid in not permitting gay marriage, women priests etc for example. OK that doesn't reflect society today however many ARE moving in that direction. Again, it can be argued that such change is very slow as we're not there yet but if you consider how staunch these denominations were against such change in the past, the fact many are closer to allowing it is indicative of a modernisation-of-sorts. Sadly it is VERY slow but they're getting there.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    One of the issues with organised religion isn't that it's "slow to adopt", it's that it's pulling in the opposite direction of progress. You take any issue of sexual and gender equality and you can be pretty sure The Big Three are actively and unapologetically on the wrong side of the debate. Take condom use in African countries, for example: it stretches the limits of human comprehension that the Catholic church could oppose it. But they do.

    I've never heard an atheist argue that all religious folk are evil or dangerous or likely to explode themselves on public transport. It's patently obvious this isn't the case. But I'd argue that the moderate religious folk are having to ignore vast swathes of their religious texts and preachings in order to be moderate. I've read the religious texts. They're not paragons of pacifism and compassion; they have an unhealthy fixation with various situations you should commit murder for other people's perceived religious transgressions.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    .....when 'taken out of context'.....
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Being that you identify as a Christian I'm going to assume that, as I have, you've read the Bible. You know there's no way you can put in to context stoning a women to death on her father's doorstep for the crime of not being a virgin on her wedding night. That was a morally repugnant act then and it would be one now. And it's not as if other cultures at the time hadn't figured out that fire and brimstone and murder wasn't the best way to organise a society concerned with reducing suffering and the prospering of healthy citizens.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    You know there's no way you can put in to context stoning a women to death on her father's doorstep for the crime of not being a virgin on her wedding night. That was a morally repugnant act then and it would be one now.

    However put in to context, stoning to death was the punishment for many crimes of that time. About other cultures, the Romans used fear of death as their punishment, it was quite widespread at the time.

    Note that I'm not saying not being a virgin on the wedding night is acceptable excuse for any sort of punishment, or that death by stoning is by any way acceptable. But it's another example where atheists cherry-pick sections of the bible without context.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I invite you to put stoning a women to death for not being a virgin on her wedding night into context for me. Which context makes that anything other than a morally repugnant act? Now or then.

    And given that the Bible, an allegedly divinely-inspired text, doesn't stand out from the morality of its day, and is often found advocating far worse morality than was contemporarily available, why on Earth should I - or anyone else for that matter - take anything it says seriously? Let alone start to embark on the project of ordering my life around it.

    However, if what you mean by 'context' is 'here's a book from a barbarous dessert tribe that's full of barbarism' then I agree. That is the context in which this, at best, very ordinary, and at worst, terrifyingly sadist, book was crafted.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I invite you to put stoning a women to death for not being a virgin on her wedding night into context for me. Which context makes that anything other than a morally repugnant act? Now or then.

    I'll play along. Scripture at the time decreed that her not being a virgin on her wedding night was a sin/crime. Society at the time (independent of religion) decided that the punishment for many crimes was stoning to death.
    And given that the Bible, an allegedly divinely-inspired text, doesn't stand out from the morality of its day, and is often found advocating far worse morality than was contemporarily available, why on Earth should I - or anyone else for that matter - take anything it says seriously? Let alone start to embark on the project of ordering my life around it.

    However, if what you mean by 'context' is 'here's a book from a barbarous dessert tribe that's full of barbarism' then I agree. That is the context in which this, at best, very ordinary, and at worst, terrifyingly sadist, book was crafted.

    Look, if some atheists have the attitude of "THIS is why your beliefs are wrong and MINE are right" then all the power to them - but I don't work that way. You're asking me to somehow make the bible more agreeable to you and I refuse on two counts. 1) why the hell should I? I'm not telling you what you or anyone else should believe. I offer explanations, not excuses. if you or anyone else won't accept them then I'm not going to lose any sleep over it, and 2) you've clearly already made up your mind about religion, if I was the type to try to impose my beliefs on you then I'd be wasting my time.

    The whole point of my participating in this thread was not to tell anyone "No, your views are wrong". I'll leave that to the anti-religionists, all the power to them. What I do is point out where "new atheism" has double standards and is no better or worse than the evangelicals it claims to despise.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    CM Punk wrote: »
    I'll play along. Scripture at the time decreed that her not being a virgin on her wedding night was a sin/crime. Society at the time (independent of religion) decided that the punishment for many crimes was stoning to death

    Wrong. Scripture explicitly says she should be stoned to death
    vs 20 But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: vs 21 Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father's house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    Wrong. Scripture explicitly says she should be stoned to death

    Polite response, let's aim it back at you.

    Wrong. Stoning to death at the time was considered by society to be punishment for certain crimes. Thus was included in scripture.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    So, all scripture is made up and not at all the word of God (because there isn't one). Why are there religions? Why are you a Christian if it's lies?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    So, all scripture is made up and not at all the word of God (because there isn't one). Why are there religions? Why are you a Christian if it's lies?

    Do you still mug old ladies? (also I object to you trying to push your beliefs on me, please could you do that elsewhere, thanks)
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Freedom of speech is a wonderful thing. There is no God. Never has been, never will be.

    If you are picking and choosing (as a Christian) from the Bible, because some of it's right and some of it's wrong (or true and not true) you are exactly the same as an atheist with humanist morals. At least atheists are brave enough to admit we cherry pick our morals.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    Freedom of speech is a wonderful thing.

    Whilst acknowledging that the UK doesn't have (and never had) a 'right of free speech', I agree with your sentiment and hope you apply it should you ever feel annoyed at someone professing their religious beliefs in public.
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    There is no God. Never has been, never will be.

    Your right to believe that, I'm not knocking you for it, that's between you and God.
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    If you are picking and choosing (as a Christian) from the Bible, because some of it's right and some of it's wrong (or true and not true) you are exactly the same as an atheist with humanist morals. At least atheists are brave enough to admit we cherry pick our morals.

    I bet that gives you enormous satisfaction. I have never claimed otherwise that some of Christianity requires modernisation and some of the 'old ideals' are out-dated. The difference is that I'm able to STFU about it.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    CM Punk wrote: »
    Your right to believe that, I'm not knocking you for it, that's between you and God.
    Well, not really, it's about me.

    If you want to "STFU" about it, feel free, this whole thread is about beliefs, and the forum is about debate. Frankly I am pretty satisfied with my religious/irreligious/a-religious position, mainly because it makes it super easy to changed my mind based on scientific evidence.


    ETA: Just so you know, UK is under the human rights act, and article 10 defends freedom of expression.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    Well, not really, it's about me.

    If you want to "STFU" about it, feel free, this whole thread is about beliefs, and the forum is about debate. Frankly I am pretty satisfied with my religious/irreligious/a-religious position, mainly because it makes it super easy to changed my mind based on scientific evidence.

    I'm pleased for you.

    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    ETA: Just so you know, UK is under the human rights act, and article 10 defends freedom of expression.

    Right. You go on Twitter and exercise your 'freedom of expression' about how you "know" that Rolf Harris is guilty of all the allegations made about him as see how far that freedom gets you.

    In fact why not go one better - why not tell the world on Twitter that you "know" Mark Bridger is guilty of the murder of April Jones then email the judge of the ongoing case a link to it. Freedom of speech, right?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Never mind.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Christ, I, neither, can be bothered...
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Fiend_85 wrote: »
    At least atheists are brave enough to admit we cherry pick our morals.

    Do they? If you admit you cherry-pick your morals, that negates any basis for your morality beyond "coz I think so". More sophisticated athiests tend to argue their morality has an inherent, universal logic...
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