Be a good little atheist...

[Weak Kitten]

Your response doesn't address Weak Kitten's post at all. The point being made was that it provides hope and comfort, not that it creates "good behavior."

Thank you! I was starting to wonder if I had worded my statement improperly.

However, I must admit that you trump me by being much more concise, well done.

 

[JoelKatz]

It's no necessarily that they are lazy or bad, they just can't do it. And as long as their safety blanket doesn't hurt anyone else there is no reason to yank it away from them.

Unfortunately, their safety blanket does hurt other people. Human history is filled with incidents where religious belief has directly caused massive human misery. This massive, unnecessary suffering and death will continue until the vast majority of people know how to respond to "I did it because I believed God wanted me to" with "that's completely unacceptable in civilized society".

 

[marplots]

Unfortunately, their safety blanket does hurt other people. Human history is filled with incidents where religious belief has directly caused massive human misery. This massive, unnecessary suffering and death will continue until the vast majority of people know how to respond to "I did it because I believed God wanted me to" with "that's completely unacceptable in civilized society".

Here's my problem with this framing. Since I do not think there is a God who influences people to make these kinds of errors, I am left thinking it is the people themselves who are making the mistakes. If I remove God/religion from the explanation above, I get the same thing that happens to me as an atheist--mistakes.

Maybe religious belief leads to a particularly nasty sort of error, but I'm not sure. Without religion, you'd get another justification: "I think I'm right."

 

[Weak Kitten]

Unfortunately, their safety blanket does hurt other people. Human history is filled with incidents where religious belief has directly caused massive human misery. This massive, unnecessary suffering and death will continue until the vast majority of people know how to respond to "I did it because I believed God wanted me to" with "that's completely unacceptable in civilized society".

And if all theists were cowards who hide behind their god and do terrible things in it's name I would agree wholeheartedly. But for those people religion is just a convenient excuse. If they didn't have religion they would go with race or nationality or any number of other excuses.

There are many good, kind theists out there and I see no reason to cause them emotional distress needlessly. It is fine to guide them, on an individual basis, to think critically about their religion. However, that doesn't mean being confrontational or calling them idiots or badmouthing their faith. Doing those things just makes people cling all the tighter to their religion and stop thinking.

I don't think any of us want to cause others to stop thinking, do we?

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Doing those things just makes people cling all the tighter to their religion and stop thinking.

And you don't think that's a problem, do yoU?

 

[mutile]

Any person that donates money to the catholic church is not a good theist, they are supporters of child rape.

 

[Cavemonster]

Don't take this the wrong way but there is a reason for religion to exist. To many people living miserable, small lives with no opportunity to better their position religion gives them a hope that they will get to experience something better, someday. To some it even gives them a reason to plan for the future because they will be able to "look down" on their grandchildren and see that their sacrifices made a difference.

Facing the idea that there is no divine retribution, that some crimes will never be punished and some kindnesses will never be re-payed, is a hard thing. Not everyone has the education, time or mental ability to work through that realization and create personal meaning in their life. It's no necessarily that they are lazy or bad, they just can't do it. And as long as their safety blanket doesn't hurt anyone else there is no reason to yank it away from them.

By the way, I am an agnostic atheist. I don't feel that being nice and understanding of theists makes me a lesser person.

I do agree with this broadly, but it has some problems.

Why do you think that so many people are incapable of finding comfort and hope without these systems? Just because they don't decide to spontaeneously abandon them? Of course many who were brought up to believe that the church is their only source of comfort and hope will believe that, it's been taught to them.

But look at the countries now that are becoming majority areligious that a few generations back were not so. Is something drastically changing within their make-ups to suddenly allow them to find hope elsewhere, or is it just that they are free of the inertia of the church.

I don't think you need to be a deep philosopher and scholar to deal with the negatives and positives of life without imagining gods and devils. You do not need an advanced degree or oodles of time spent staring out the window to understand that crap happens or to find joy in helping others without some eternal reward.

To say that some are incapable of this, is kind of belittling. What they are incapable of, in my opinion, is breaking free of the social comfort of agreeing with those around them.

 

[amb]

Quite a large proportion of church attendees do it for socializing. Without this they may be lonely. Bingo nights are especially popular and well attended by the middle aged and beyond.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Quite a large proportion of church attendees do it for socializing. Without this they may be lonely. Bingo nights are especially popular and well attended by the middle aged and beyond.

The churches are turning into senior centers in the US.

In the frontier days "Sunday meeting" was a way to catch up with the gossip. Six days a week the women folk would be stuck on a remote farm, working from sun up to sun down along with the men. Then for 2-3 hours they could socialize away from there IF they went to church. I suspect even then it wasn't so much about religion as getting out of the house.

 

[JoelKatz]

And if all theists were cowards who hide behind their god and do terrible things in it's name I would agree wholeheartedly. But for those people religion is just a convenient excuse. If they didn't have religion they would go with race or nationality or any number of other excuses.

I think this is just a form of special pleading. If I were speaking out against racism, would you be arguing that there's no point in upsetting peaceful racists? After all, the harmful racists would just find some other excuse to cause problems.

I don't believe evil is like a whack-a-mole game. It is possible to reduce the total amount of evil by reducing one source. There will always be other forms of evil, no doubt, but I don't believe they pop up to compensate and keep the total amount constant.

 

[Weak Kitten]

Look, I'm just trying to argue that going after theists and viciously attacking their beliefs is NOT the way to win them over to rationality.

Obviously, some people on this forum view religion in and of itself as some sort of evil thing that turns people into irrational monsters. Think about how you feel when people say the same thing about atheism. All it does is make you hate the point of view of the person who is making that argument.

I think the best thing to do with theists these days is to treat them kindly yet firmly. Let them know that you do not think less of them as a person because they are a theist but let them know that there is an alternative that makes more sense.

People seem to be drifting away from religion on their own these days and the best thing to do is to just gently coax them away. Let them know they are not alone. Be supportive and understanding. Religion may yet die a natural death but if you act smug and aggressive you'll just make people question their decision to leave religion.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The problem is that just about anything qualifies as a 'vicious attack' when you're dealing with the professional victim. The whole "aggressive atheist" thing is just a way to avoid dealing with the legitimate issues we raise.

 

[jcampbell]

Weak Kitten: This is an issue of strategy versus truth. Priorities are exposed by the nature of how one approaches this topic. I haven't figured out the right answers. If antitheists are right about the deleterious nature of religion, then it could behoove them to be more diplomatic in their criticisms. This is the core of Plait's panned speech entitled "Don't Be a Dick." It's as if we blast the idiocy of kinoki foot pads, people's defensiveness may increase the popularity of kinoki foot pads. Is he right? If my interpretation of his point is correct, it's that being insensitive to the point of ridiculing a belief (whether 'justified' or not) is counterproductive.

The problem with that is that we can't be honest about the fact that Jona living in a whale should be enough to provoke doubts. But it's merely missing the narrative about a wooden puppet that comes to life that prevents believers from entertaining its incredulousness. I think that point may come across as insulting to someone who invests their identity heavily in such ideas, but how is it untrue? It's an unfortunate situation where one seems to have to choose truth or diplomacy.

 

[Weak Kitten]

Well said jcampbell. I'm only advocating for a bit more diplomacy. "Don't be a Dick" is a pretty concise summation of my feelings at this point.

Also, I feel it is wrong to blame religion for all of the horrors of history while at the same time not giving it credit for any of the good things it has brought. It has produce order, stability and an attempt to explain why you should be nice to other people. I won't say religion is blameless in the bad things in history but please don't be so one sided in your analysis of it.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

We won't be getting a definition of "Don't be a dick", of course.

 

[bokonon]

The problem with that is that we can't be honest about the fact that Jona living in a whale should be enough to provoke doubts. But it's merely missing the narrative about a wooden puppet that comes to life that prevents believers from entertaining its incredulousness. I think that point may come across as insulting to someone who invests their identity heavily in such ideas, but how is it untrue? It's an unfortunate situation where one seems to have to choose truth or diplomacy.

I think you can be honest about it without being a jerk.

"That's a pretty unbelievable story."

"It was a miracle."

"I don't believe in miracles."

"I do."

as opposed to

"You're not actually stupid enough to think that somebody lived in a big fish under the ocean, are you? Did he build a fire and cook cod in there too? What's next, talking marionettes? 'I just want to be a REAL boy' -- HAW HAW HAW!"

Seriously, at the end of the day, whether or not somebody believes that Jonah lived in a fish is generally a harmless belief. It's not as though Judeo-Christians are walking around saying, "What's with all these homeless people? Aren't the oceans still full of FISH?"

Save the ridicule for people like Phelps, and 99.9999% of theists will agree with you.

 

[quadraginta]

I think you can be honest about it without being a jerk.

"That's a pretty unbelievable story."

"It was a miracle."

"I don't believe in miracles."

"I do."

as opposed to

"You're not actually stupid enough to think that somebody lived in a big fish under the ocean, are you? Did he build a fire and cook cod in there too? What's next, talking marionettes? 'I just want to be a REAL boy' -- HAW HAW HAW!"

Seriously, at the end of the day, whether or not somebody believes that Jonah lived in a fish is generally a harmless belief. It's not as though Judeo-Christians are walking around saying, "What's with all these homeless people? Aren't the oceans still full of FISH?"

Save the ridicule for people like Phelps, and 99.9999% of theists will agree with you.

How about this conversation?

--------------------------------------------------

"That's a pretty unbelievable story."

"It was a miracle."

"I don't believe in miracles."

"I do."

"Are you calling me gullible?"

"No."

"Oh, so you're saying I'm stupid."

"No."

"I think that's pretty rude of you, attacking my faith like that!"

"Um, I didn't atta ..."

"You should have more respect for other people!!!"

"But ..."

"That's the problem with all you atheists.!!!! Always trampling on everyone else's rights!!!!!"

Etc., etc., etc.

 

[thaiboxerken]

No, 99.999999% don't agree with atheists. That's the problem. And, also, a polite disagreement or dissent of the believer's story usually turns out to be a "you're faithless scum" or "you don't believe in anything" or some such. Quadraginta's hypothetical is accurate to what I've encountered.

How does merely telling someone that their story is unbelievable do anything to actually plant doubt in their minds?

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

No, 99.999999% don't agree with atheists. That's the problem. And, also, a polite disagreement or dissent of the believer's story usually turns out to be a "you're faithless scum" or "you don't believe in anything" or some such. Quadraginta's hypothetical is accurate to what I've encountered.

How does merely telling someone that their story is unbelievable do anything to actually plant doubt in their minds?

It's defensiveness based in doubt of their position. Merkin xtians are appalling ignorant of their "faith", so making them uncomfortable by pointing out this is deemed "being a dick."

"Damned if you do, damned if you don't." That's been changed to "Damned if you don't agree with me, double damned if you dare to disagree."

 

[bokonon]

A polite disagreement or dissent of the believer's story usually turns out to be a "you're faithless scum" or "you don't believe in anything" or some such. Quadraginta's hypothetical is accurate to what I've encountered.

Next time, record it on your cell phone and post it. I'm not saying such an encounter couldn't happen, but since I've been in dozens of such conversations without encountering Quadraginta's hypothetical, the hypothetical strikes me as pretty unbelievable. I'd like to see the evidence that it really was "a polite disagreement" which provoked such an unreasonable response.