Religion and Lack of Religion

[Mr. Moon]

My views on pretty much all religions is neutral. I have no religion. If I was asked what I believe in...I'd probably say, You live then you die, and when you die, you're nothing but memories.
S'about it.

 

[Zero Moment]

My views on pretty much all religions is neutral. I have no religion. If I was asked what I believe in...I'd probably say, You live then you die, and when you die, you're nothing but memories.
S'about it.

Sooooo.....
Atheist?

 

[Dannichu]

Of course, we all know humans are predictably hating, loathing creatures

Oi, back off. Some of my best friends are humans.

 

[opaltiger]

You should also try to be more understanding-yes, evolution is logical fact with lots of evidence behind it when you look at it, but there are many people who grew up with the notion of Intelligent Design and are scared when that notion is questioned.

I see your point, but Intelligent Design isn't old enough for people to have grown up with it. Creationism in general, yes, but not Intelligent Design.

 

[Tarvos]

Besides the fact that Intelligent Design is of course a huge misnomer.

 

[Coroxn]

I see your point, but Intelligent Design isn't old enough for people to have grown up with it. Creationism in general, yes, but not Intelligent Design.

I thought Intelligent Design and Creationism were synonyms. Apparently not. ID is a new "scientific" proposal, much like Hydroplate Theory and C-Decay, I gather.

 

[JinxElite]

I'm defensive because I've had to deal with tons of harassment, rude comments, and general hatred from Christians and other such religious people for years and I've learned to expect it. Also, I have been to different churches for, as I said, the first fourteen years of my life. I know that they call evolution stupid when they know so little about it. And when I say clever, I mean conniving and weaselly. That was implied, seeing as I was at that point talking about propaganda. It is inconsistent, not noble, to have all the different denominations. At least, it is in my eyes. It's inconsistent because every different type of Christian faith has different rules, different methods of Baptism, etc., and I see that as them being inconsistent. It's not noble. It's one giant argument.
I did not say faith is stupid. I said that I don't have it. Read more carefully next time.
Also, all of you are being a lot like Christians I've encountered in the past. You pick out the bad bits, even though someone else has already picked them out, and you mostly ignore and refuse to acknowledge the logical side of what I say. I'm not trying to offend anyone or insult anyone. I'm just stating my beliefs, as is the purpose of this thread.
Also, it's rude to call my reasons for hating religion "silly". I have dealt with religion, and my reasons are my opinions. Nowhere did I say or intentionally imply that someone's reasons for being religious were "stupid", and I expect the same courtesy.

 

[Teh Ebil Snorlax]

I'm defensive because I've had to deal with tons of harassment, rude comments, and general hatred from Christians and other such religious people for years and I've learned to expect it. Also, I have been to different churches for, as I said, the first fourteen years of my life. I know that they call evolution stupid when they know so little about it. And when I say clever, I mean conniving and weaselly. That was implied, seeing as I was at that point talking about propaganda. It is inconsistent, not noble, to have all the different denominations. At least, it is in my eyes. It's inconsistent because every different type of Christian faith has different rules, different methods of Baptism, etc., and I see that as them being inconsistent. It's not noble. It's one giant argument.

My point stands; the proportion of conniving, weaselly religious is people is likely the same as the proportion of conniving, weaselly areligious people.

Also, whatever bad experiences you've had with religion don't really serve as justification for a general hatred of religion.

I did not say faith is stupid. I said that I don't have it. Read more carefully next time.
Also, all of you are being a lot like Christians I've encountered in the past. You pick out the bad bits, even though someone else has already picked them out, and you mostly ignore and refuse to acknowledge the logical side of what I say. I'm not trying to offend anyone or insult anyone. I'm just stating my beliefs, as is the purpose of this thread.

We're not ignoring the logic. There's no logic to ignore. You're projecting your personal issues with a section of the religious population of the world on to the entire religious population of the world. It's an illogical thing to do.

Also, it's rude to call my reasons for hating religion "silly". I have dealt with religion, and my reasons are my opinions. Nowhere did I say or intentionally imply that someone's reasons for being religious were "stupid", and I expect the same courtesy.

You can hardly demand respect for your opinions but not respect my opinion of your opinions. We've all dealt with religion, friend, we all have your reasons and our opinions. One of my opinions happens to be that your reasons for hating religion are silly. It's a bit unreasonable for you to launch an attack on religion in general based on your personal experiences with Christians, one in which you quite specifically refer to people who have difficulty understanding evolution (whether they believe it or not) as "morons", then get your feathers ruffled when I offer a calm, concise explanation of why I find your reasons silly.

 

[Butterfree]

Actually, the purpose of this thread is to debate, not to just state your opinion, as per the guidelines. If you post here, expect to have your reasoning challenged. Incidentally, you may not know this since you're relatively new here, but almost(?) everyone who replied to you are themselves atheists (as am I); you're being challenged on the substance of your argument, not the conclusion.

Like it or not, slinging forth generalizations about religion based on the Christians who go to your church is just not a very sound argument and you can't expect people not to comment on that in a debating thread. Hating any group as a whole based on your personal experiences with individuals who happen to belong to that group is a pretty terrible thing to do and grossly unfair to everyone who belongs to the group and does not fit your stereotypes. There are plenty of Christians who really do love and embrace other religions, understand and accept evolution, and don't employ underhanded propaganda tactics. You'd have a better argument if it were that the Bible or mainstream Christian doctrine is hypocritical because it simultaneously preaches "Love thy neighbor as thyself" etc. and claims that anyone who doesn't believe in God is a fool and that the only way to redemption is to accept Jesus - but "I know some Christians who are hypocrites, therefore Christians in general are hypocrites"? Yeah, no. That's called a hasty generalization and is a logical fallacy.

And your inconsistency argument just doesn't really make sense. If some people interpret Star Wars as being a parable about the Vietnam war, some people interpret it as being based on the fall of the Roman Empire and yet other people think it's just an archetypal hero's journey set in space with any similarities to historical events being coincidental, this does not somehow make Star Wars inconsistent; it means different people think different things about it. "I personally think that if you're gonna be religious, you should pick something and stick with it"? Religious people do pick something and stick with it; that's why these are different denominations, with each person belonging to only one (or subscribing to their own personal interpretation). It's just that not everyone agrees on what they should pick and stick with.

You have every right to be annoyed at the particular Christians who harass you, but that annoyance just doesn't logically generalize to Christians in general.

 

[Mr. Moon]

Oh my goodness. Butterfree, that's a nice wall of text...
Well, most of my family are Christian. I can easily call some of them morons, not so much a select few. Not ALL christians are people I don't like. Most of them are though. :/
I offer only an opinion. I want no debate! D:

EDIT: I almost forgot Jehovah's Witnesses. Those people just outright piss me off. Mostly because their missionaries SHOVE their beliefs, ideals, and "Watchtower" Magazines down your throat. >:L

 

[Teh Ebil Snorlax]

Oh my goodness. Butterfree, that's a nice wall of text...
Well, most of my family are Christian. I can easily call some of them morons, not so much a select few. Not ALL christians are people I don't like. Most of them are though. :/
I offer only an opinion. I want no debate! D:

EDIT: I almost forgot Jehovah's Witnesses. Those people just outright piss me off. Mostly because their missionaries SHOVE their beliefs, ideals, and "Watchtower" Magazines down your throat. >:L

You know, if you'd taken the time to pick apart that wall (actually a relatively short post), you might have noticed this brick right at the top;

Actually, the purpose of this thread is to debate, not to just state your opinion, as per the guidelines.

Anyway, in response to what you're saying; what exactly are you saying? I get the impression that you're saying you don't like the stupid Christian members of your family and that you don't dislike all Christians, but it's hard to be sure, to be honest.

 

[Coroxn]

It is inconsistent, not noble, to have all the different denominations. At least, it is in my eyes. It's inconsistent because every different type of Christian faith has different rules, different methods of Baptism, etc., and I see that as them being inconsistent. It's not noble. It's one giant argument.

I did not say all denominations were noble, just Martin Luther's reasons for starting his own. Inconsistent? Christianity isn't one organism, flitting between denominations-certain people pick certain ones and stick with them consistently. It's no more inconsistent than the human race is for having differing opinions on any subject.

I did not say faith is stupid. I said that I don't have it. Read more carefully next time.

"Some religious people are clever" implies "but most are stupid. Otherwise, you wouldn't have said "some". You may have intended to mean conniving and weaselly, but you said clever.

Also, all of you are being a lot like Christians I've encountered in the past. You pick out the bad bits, even though someone else has already picked them out, and you mostly ignore and refuse to acknowledge the logical side of what I say. I'm not trying to offend anyone or insult anyone. I'm just stating my beliefs, as is the purpose of this thread.

The logical side of what you said was "Some religious people are like this, so I hate them all". Which is like saying "I was mugged by two Asians, all Asians are violent assholes". Pretty illogical, if you ask me. And as has been said before, the purpose of this thread is not to state beliefs, it is to debate them. Which we are doing, by refuting your argument.

 

[Mr. Moon]

I'm trying to say I judge I judge people as individuals, not what Religious group they belong to. That's all.
Except the Jehovah's. I dislike ALL OF THEM.

 

[Teh Ebil Snorlax]

I'm trying to say I judge I judge people as individuals, not what Religious group they belong to. That's all.
Except the Jehovah's. I dislike ALL OF THEM.

Oh, well, in that case, I think you're a horrible person. Sorry about that. I don't really see a problem with Jehovah's Witnesses myself, I've known quite a few over the years, never had any problems with them. Sure, the ones that call to your house to preach and stuff can be a little annoying but their heart is in a good place, so I don't really mind them all that much. It seems a bit ridiculous to me to dislike an entire religion because certain members of it irk.

 

[Coroxn]

I'm trying to say I judge I judge people as individuals, not what Religious group they belong to. That's all.
Except the Jehovah's. I dislike ALL OF THEM.

Jehovah's witnesses are only trying to help you. It's in their religion to convert other people-in their eyes there is a world full of people who will suffer if they don't go out and save them. My own experience with Jehovah's Witnesses are that they aren't pushy. They talk and give pamphlets and if you tell them you aren't interested they go away. Maybe some are more pushy, but you can always close the door on them. And they do mean well, even if they go about it rather badly.

Besides, they do have other facets to their personalities. I hope you can learn to not hate the person, just the religion and the practice.

 

[Vladimir Putin's LJ]

I have a question related to the discussion at hand :o

I agree that hating all members of a religion is silly, but what about disliking the institution itself? For instance, I have plenty of Catholic family members and friends and I obviously like them, but I really have an aversion to the Catholic church as an institution.
Similarly, I don't personally know any Mormons and I'm sure they're nice, but I really think the whole 'let's donate money to another state's anti-gay hate campaign lol thereby ruining thousands of lives lol' was disgusting.

Maybe I'm just being grossly unfair but I really don't much like religious institutions, I guess? And while I agree that door-to-door religion salesmen probably have their hearts in the right place, I find it a little hard to remember when they come say hello at nine on a Sunday. I'm always polite and I always end up getting an armful of pamphlets and wish them a good day but there are few things that tick me off more. It just seems rude, I guess. In the same way that I don't think atheism should be forced on anyone, I really wish they'd respect my right to not be saved from armageddon :/

 

[Mr. Moon]

I really wish they'd respect my right to not be saved from Armageddon :/

Sigged. ^

Let me correct myself. I don't dislike the people that show up at my door and hand me pamphlets. (I've actually read a few. Not interesting enough to convert me though. xD) I don't like how they go about trying to convert people.

 

[Zero Moment]

I have a question related to the discussion at hand :o

I agree that hating all members of a religion is silly, but what about disliking the institution itself? For instance, I have plenty of Catholic family members and friends and I obviously like them, but I really have an aversion to the Catholic church as an institution.
Similarly, I don't personally know any Mormons and I'm sure they're nice, but I really think the whole 'let's donate money to another state's anti-gay hate campaign lol thereby ruining thousands of lives lol' was disgusting.

Maybe I'm just being grossly unfair but I really don't much like religious institutions, I guess? And while I agree that door-to-door religion salesmen probably have their hearts in the right place, I find it a little hard to remember when they come say hello at nine on a Sunday. I'm always polite and I always end up getting an armful of pamphlets and wish them a good day but there are few things that tick me off more. It just seems rude, I guess. In the same way that I don't think atheism should be forced on anyone, I really wish they'd respect my right to not be saved from armageddon :/

I generally dislike churches in general

Will eloborate later, brain is tired as fuchl

 

[Butterfree]

An institution is a cohesive entity that has people who act on its behalf in an official capacity, so I'd say it's perfectly sensible to dislike an institution the same way you'd dislike a single person (so long as this doesn't blend over into hating people who are associated with the institution but don't necessarily agree with the policies that make you dislike it).

 

[Minish]

Oh, well, in that case, I think you're a horrible person. Sorry about that. I don't really see a problem with Jehovah's Witnesses myself, I've known quite a few over the years, never had any problems with them.

Um, you're being a little hypocritical! You're still making judgement on a whole based on your experience, and as you've said, that's not a good idea. The best thing to do is try to consider the person apart from where their beliefs might come from like VPLJ, I think.

Though, I mean, if someone's a strict Catholic, I don't feel that guilty about predicting I won't like them? Because being a strict Catholic comes with some things that I really don't like! I'm sure they might be quite kind and nice, just not necessarily someone I'd get on with or stand to be around! Being all "but some of them are nice people!!!" seems less useful than examining why you've disliked all the ones you've met before, and what the really bad thing is (the institution). I would parse 'I don't like Catholic people' as 'I don't like Catholicism' rather than 'I refuse to believe any Catholic person could ever be nice even though I haven't met them all', honestly.