Religious Fun Groups For the Kids!
2009 February 22
This is A SARCASTIC look at what religion does. This site is not promoting these groups, but we are criticizing them.
This group teaches children about racial and ethnic diversity.
This group teaches children that everyone outside their religion are “infidels”.
This group teaches children that gays are an “abomination to God”.
This group teaches children how to bomb the shit out of infidels and Jews.
This group teaches children how to pray and how to despise non-Christians by using the “you’re going to Hell” card.
This group teaches children how to worship graven images and how their parents are willing to submit them to pedophile Priests.
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We definitely need to “fight” back with an improved education system. How about required ethics classes at every grade level!
I think that is a great idea but where will you obtain the values? There must be an absolute to mark something as a standard in “ethics” – knowing right from wrong. It has to do with character building as well. Whose character shall be immulated? Everything in society is relative….so your statement is faulty – unless it has a true standard to emmulate or govern it’s success or failure.
TO ALL OF YOU.
Its so pathetic how you tell the world to be open minded, yet you point fingers and spread lies about christians.
I dont care about kkk or extreme islam, because they do not truly follow their Gods. If they did, they wouldnt hate.
So, you open your minds, and stop blaming the lord, when its ignorant people like yourselves who fall prey to media and propaganda.
Hell is not a fear tactic, just a truth.
WE don’t believe in your imaginary friend.
The KKK and pedophile priests belong to Christianity and they believe in your imaginary friend just as much as you do.
What’s next….Roeder(the murderer of Dr. Tiller) wasn’t a Christian either?
I agree with you. many “christians” do make mistakes. But i do not think what Christians do should represent the whole religion of christianity. There are good and true christians and hypocritical wrong christians. But what some Christian does cant be the reason why you hate the religion. For example..in this country there are good and bad people. i dont think its right to use the actions of the bad people as a reason to hate the entire country..Or how about there are good and bad people in a certain race. Does that mean the whole race is bad? .im not sure if thats a good example but i gave it a shot. Christianity is good and is about love. but people have tainted it. Because we are ALL sinners. Its wrong for christians to think they are better than others. We all make mistakes. But that does not mean God is not good. God remains constant through it all. Im sorry that you feel this way….
but YES it is very saddening when christians say “your going to hell” and stuff like that….i totally do not agree with that.
real christianity isnt about having a religion. its about having a relationship with God. who i do believe is real and king.
/im not trying to be attack you in any way…i just wanted to share.
but i dont think pointing out things like Priest molest children that is why christians are wrong is right. Because those are actions of people. and Christianity does not revolve on the actions of the people. It revolves around God.
I agree with you brother they have no right to blaim my Jesus by spreading lies. My Lord says to love everyone including those who are lost here my email XXXXXXXX.com anyone wants to chat just email me we have talk all day just say “regarding God” so I won’t delete it Jesus came to save you all from yourself God bless you’ll. Email people
Did someone here ask you for your email?
If you’re so lonely for chat, why not try your God or Jesus?
I agree. Well said.
Your absolutely right and it saddens me such hatered to our Lord has risen up. Your a good man and I hope you spread the Gospel. Obviously we need it these are just people who have to belive. But thanks so much for putting that out there.
Well, this isn’t the Old Time Gospel Hour…so, go spread your gospel over a corn field. BS is a great fertilizer.
Another deluded nut. Bye, nutjob.
@ Sheila Price
Well, that would be a great start.
Personally, I think if the Americans promoted intelligence rather than consumerism and stardom, we’d have a smarter society and less religion.
You mean you don’t give a shit about Beyoncé and Paris Hilton and what they do and who they screw?
Mark can I borrow these pics? Somebody started a thread on a forum I’m on about outlawing religious teaching under the age of 18.
It would be really good if such a law could be enacted, but it would probably be quickly shot down as unconstitutional.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
@ Moonbeam
Of course!
I agree, Mark. Consumerism and entertainment make money for Big Business and pacify, mollify, and generally distract the populace from the real issues facing us. In addition, much of it promotes and habituates us to violence.
You are right. Going after the latest iPod or iPhone and watching shows with a lot of violence make us into utterly passive agents only too ready to accept whatever bullshit the U.S. oligarchy wants to feed us.
I once saw a cartoon showing our economic system as a gigantic sow with perhaps a hundred tits and the American public as being a bunch of piglets sucking on them.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
What I find ironic is the way people these days freak out about a sex offender of any type lives on the same block, but won’t hesitate to allow their young sons to be alter boys.
You mean they haven’t learned yet? I didn’t think people were that aggressively stupid.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Here is the English version of an article I will soon be publishing on my blog, “Interlingua multilingue”:
A survey made in Ireland has revealed “endemic” sexual abuse in Catholic orphanages in that country. According to the Commission of Inquiry into Child Abuse, 1,090 people claim to have suffered from physical violence and sexual abuse in more than 100 religious institutions investigated over the past nine years. The investigators also discovered that church leaders knew about the sexual abuse of boys.
The report also revealed that boys and girls were restrained with leather strips for talking during meals or for writing with their left hand. “The administration of the schools was very severe, imposing oppressive and unreasonable discipline on the children and staff,” says the report.
The committee was created in 2000 by the then Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern, who apologized on behalf of the victims of child abuse. A government compensation plan was established at the time and since then has paid almost 1 billion euros to victims of these abuses
Thousands of victims testified before the committee, which was established after a TV series showed the scale of the abuse. The journalist Mary Raftery, who conducted the program, said the extent of the abuse was “deeply shocking.” According to the journalist, the children were taken to “houses of terror” and were confined in them until their seventeenth birthday. “They went out of these institutions utterly disturbed, and many then left Ireland,” she said. “They felt that they had been completely abandoned by their country everything else, including their religion.”
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Here is the English version of a followup article on Catholic child abuse in Ireland that I published on http://hkyson.wordpress.com:
————————————————
The anger and strong feelings of extreme revulsion against the Catholic Church in Ireland have grown to the point that the Irish have come to the conclusion that the Church has not paid enough for the abuse of girls and boys in Irash Catholic institutions.
In reaction to public pressure, eighteen religious orders agreed to form part of an independent audit and said they will offer more compensation to people who were beaten and raped in Catholic schools.
It is estimated that the claims of victims will exceed $1.5 billion, higher than the $180 million the church negotiated with the Irish government in 2002.
This sequence of scandals involving pedopriests has completely destroyed the prestige of the catholic church in Irish society. Moreover, many people in Ireland find these scandals especially galling because many defendant priests did not spend any time in prison.
These problems in the Catholic Church, which have been particularly severe in the United States and Ireland, are accelerating the process of dechristianization in Europe. Probably these practices have taken place in other European countries but have not yet been revealed publicly.
Thanks; posted. A picture is worth 1000 word, so I didn’t even say anything.
We are not born with this weirdness in place, but obviously we are born with a susceptibility to it and if the people we love trust and respect plant prejudice and violence in us it it will often germinate and take root.
Not quite clear on this one, Tyo, Are you blaming your parents or your teachers for your weirdness and prejudice? Oh – sorry, it’s not you who is weird and prejudiced, it’s everybody else!
Yawn. What I was trying to say. Redsetta. Is that things like racism and homophobia and using violence as a tool for settling disputes and a lot of other stuff that’s not very nice can be taught and apparently fairly easily if you catch ‘em young enough. Christians are brilliant at it.
And now show me were I said that I was somehow immune to this very human susceptibility. I’m not. Far from it. It’s just that I don’t need a magical mythical being to tell me that I need improvement.
You seem quite enlightened to me!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Love and worship your god. Then use him to justify everything you do. Sounds like a pretty good deal to me. No wonder so many people do it.
I’m sorry this is rediculous us christians need to stop being fake and be like jesus and stop hideing what is right and i think it is our freedom to do what we please i think it is now or chance to rise up as a nation and stop worrying who we are because for one if u havent noticed this nation was founded on the gospel of jesus christ. And Why are we trying to make our churches more secer friendly by takein out the cross i think we should more of the cross in our churches and people are stupid to think that the cross is not real for one it is recorded down in history. jesus rose once and he will rise again and yes this is coming from a 16 year old girl but this wasnt me saying it this is jesus christ telling you that he loves you and that he shed every ounce of bloood in his body for you so that u could be made new ur sins can be forgiven
GOD BLESS..
Uh, you need to read about the French Enlightenment and how our founders were Deists, not Christians, and how they feared religious bigotry because they had experienced it during our colonial era and refused to establish any religion as official in our constitution.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
um you need to realize that you have no idea what your talking about and before you bash a religion you should do some research on it, chrisitanity doesnt have a founder, its just a name for the people who believe the bibles teachings and all it says about the life jesus. this was long before france was even around.
You mean France was founded yet as “France”. It was Gaul before Christ was even born.
And anyone can bash religion all they want on this blog.
My blog…… my rules.
Thanks a lot. I’ll continue bashing religion with great pleasure. I find it very therapeutic!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Lindsay, Did you even read Harleigh’s comment?
If you did you are an idiot because your response had little to nothing to do with it. If not, you are ignorant for the same reason.
He was talking about “founding fathers” of the US.
Reading is fundamental.
Thanks. I’m now sorry I said “founders” instead of “founding fathers.”
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Oh, I hope that’s not really a post from a 16 year old. I guess they thought they were texting their friend. So many grammmmmmmmmmmmmatical and spelllllllllllllllllllllllling err-roars.
What is incredible sad is the complete lack of intelligence in this article and how I find the same patterns of thought from Atheist that one finds in fundamentalists. You are either a part of my group or you are an outcast, stupid and insane. These are qualities of an ignorant individual who needs to quickly understand the true qualities of religion and stop being told and believing sources that are clearly biased, such as this article. 1) Islam is not a religion of hate. Fundamentalist Islamic rulers are akin to KKK members and the WBC. It is THE type of belief. KKK does NOT represent the whole of Christianity. Also not all Catholic Priests are pedophiles. In fact a VERY small percentage are, like less than 1%. If that means all priests are pedophiles then you have a VERY skewed way of viewing the world. Yes, the KKK, WBC, Hamas, Al Queda. Evil forms of religion. They are not representive of God but of themselves. They have formed their own belief structure out of fierce emotions and hatred they have developed on their own. Yes, Education can solve this problem since most of these people are ill-educated to begin with.
That’s funny…I did not describe any pic as all. It describes as specific groups. Besides, 1 out of 20 Priests are abusers of children.
Why not say that 19 out of 20 priests are non-abusers of children? Doesn’t have quite the effect you’re going for, huh?
I hope you don’t mean to indicate, madlove78, that you find it utterly insignificant that five percent of all Catholic priests are abusers of children.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Actually, it sounds worse…
it dose not matter by percentages or any of that bullshit u can believe wat ever you want to. there be more than 1 way to heaven.
What is incredibl(y) sad is your inability to spell. But also that you have missed the point. These hate groups spawn from religion, not the other way around.
And not every priest is a sex offender, but the Vatican ( i.e. Catholic HQ) chooses to hide these offenses from the public and punish and/or bribe the victims so they will keep quiet.
how do you know the vatican hides this?
Sorry it took me so long: I just now saw this reply.
Direct order from the catholic higher-ups!!!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_sex_abuse_cases#Church_policies_and_attitudes
Of course the Vatican would stonewall this abuse–or anything else that would throw the Church in a bad light.
They are just like the drug company that made thalidomide who tried to cover up the bad effects of that drug or the tobacco companies that did the same.
Unfortunately, in the case of drugs that cause birth defects or products that cause cancer, the truth will eventually come out because of the increasingly heavy weight of statistical evidence..
In the case of covering up for pedopriests, the Catholic church will try to insist that they were only a few bad apples and that the church has eliminated this practice.
By the way, the federal government has tried this strategy in the case of our own interrogators that use torture techniques.
When I was younger and the Los Angeles Police Department abused manorities such as blacks, latinos, and gays more frequently and systematically, occasionally this abuse would be revealed publicly. It was always written off as being the aberrant behavior of a few bad apples.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
I am quite sure that gay people are at all levels of the Vatican hierarchy. I can’t understand why they would stay in an organization that says they are pieces of shit. At the very least, they must have very serious self-esteem problems.
I have no way of knowing whether Pope RATzinger is gay or not, but I am quite confident that many people in the Curia are indeed gay and that they do what they can to protect other gays in that utterly perverse organization.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Well maybe it is true that less than one percent of priests are peadophiles, but history shows us that within the catholic church heirachy there has been wide spread, systemic protection of those peodophiles.
This has meant that once abusers have been exposed within the church, rather than expell them to prevent further abuse and hand them over to the authorities to be prosecuted, (as would happen if you were a teacher for example) the church has simply ignored or paid off victims and relocated the abuser to another vulnerable group of believers, to start the terrible cycle of abuse once again. And in many cases again and again and again.
You cannot controll the actions of an individual, but the church as an institution has silently condoned this abuse for decades, through its unwillingness to confront and eradicate the perpetrators in its midst.
Parents with children who have been sexually abused by priests, as I am sure you will agree, should go directly to the police instead of to a Catholic bishop.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Here’s some powerful evidence showing that parents with children that have been sexually abused by priests cannot trust the Catholic hierarchy to do anything but protect the priests:
……………………………………………………
Endemic sexual abuse of boys in Ireland
A survey made in Ireland has revealed “endemic” sexual abuse in Catholic orphanages in that country. According to the Commission of Inquiry into Child Abuse, 1,090 people claim to have suffered from physical violence and sexual abuse in more than 100 religious institutions investigated over the past nine years. The investigators also discovered that church leaders knew about the sexual abuse of boys.
The report also revealed that boys and girls were restrained with leather straps for talking during meals or for writing with their left hand. “The administration of the schools was very severe, imposing oppressive and unreasonable discipline on the children and staff,” says the report.
The committee was created in 2000 by the then Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern, who apologized to these victims of child abuse. A government compensation plan was established at the time and since then has paid almost one billion euros to these abuse victims.
Thousands of victims testified before the committee, which was established after a TV series showed the scale of the abuse. The journalist Mary Raftery, who conducted the program, said the extent of the abuse was “deeply shocking.” According to the journalist, the children were taken to “houses of terror” and were confined in them until their seventeenth birthday. “They went out of these institutions utterly disturbed, and many then left Ireland,” she said. “They felt that they had been completely abandoned by their country and all its institutions, including religion.”
The report suggests twenty-one ways that the government can use to redeem itself, including the construction of a memorial to the victims of this abuse, improvement in psychological services for victims who are still alive, and improvements in protective services for the children of Ireland.
Next month another report will be published on alleged abuses by Catholic priests in parishes near Dublin, the capital of Ireland.
Awright! Time for my wingnut fix. How incredible lucky of me.
First of all, this guy doesn’t endorse Islam well enough. And I agree, the KKK does not represent the whole of Christianity, just the best and brightest. And even if there are less than 1% pedophile priests in the Catholic church, isn’t that still a sizable chunk? I’d be less worried about a gay priest. Pedophilia is a developmental disorder. Some guys just never grow up, I guess. But I think I understand how they’re feeling. You know, God tells you you can’t ever have sex, even though you’re thinking about it all the time. And besides, when those cute little choirboys are in church, they’re on the priests’ home turf, damn it… well, I’d better stop right there. Besides, you know someone else is going to steal away the child’s innocence sooner or later; why not have it done by one of God’s chosen few right now? Right there in the church? Sounds like the ideal place to me!
Let me tell you as a gay guy, getting fucked in the ass can be quite painful. While a lot of us come to enjoy it, I have always found it to be either painful or uncomfortable. That is why I prefer to get of by jerking off. Now if I were ten years old and some Catholic priest (or anybody else, for that matter) forced me to get fucked in the ass, I would feel as though I had been stabbed!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Well, that’s why they’d never let you be a man of the cloth. Jerking off is forbidden, and there are no earthly loopholes around it, either. But the attractive choirboys, on the other hand… who knew? Perfectly okay! The ends justify the means on that one!
It’s a shame that the Christian religion forbids handjobs. They are a nice way of getting yourself off, and some people are particularly skilled at getting other guys off this way.
Beating off should also be encouraged, because you can’t get AIDS by beating someone off unless your hands have bleeding cuts.
From what I understand, tantric sex, which is considered something of a sacrament by the Hindus, is essentially nothing more than a prolonged J/O session.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
I don’t know if beating off should necessarily be encouraged, but it shouldn’t be forbidden. I’ve found that foot jobs are a hard way of getting yourself off, and not particularly satisfying, either. But that’s just me.
Here’s a nice set of lyrics to the song Funiculí Funiculà:
Last night, I stayed up late to masturbate.
It felt so good.
I knew it would.
Last night, I stayed up late to masturbate.
It felt so nice.
I did it twice.
God, you should have seen me on the short stroke.
It felt so grand.
I used my hand.
Christ, you should have seen me on the long stroke.
It felt so neat.
I used my feet.
Wham it, bam it, slam it on the floor.
Thump it, bump it.
Do it then some more.
They say a lay a day’s a better way
To keep you feeling grand.
But as for me I much prefer the technique of the hand!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
The Church often leaves it clear:
Only sex in the missionary position without a condom for the purpose of procreation is allowed.
Oh wait, so then what’s with those little kids?
FUCK YOU KKK
Maybe you should directly express your feelings to them. I don’t think many of them visit here.
See how much hatred an imaginary God can lead to?
That was my point exactly!
Fuck religion, I have nothing against it, as long as they keep in in their heads, where it belongs..
I think people use religion to overcome their weakness because they can’t face their fear of the death. And if you don’t beleive in what they beleive then you must be wrong because in their mind, they are now so important so everything else have to be bullshi*t. And I ain’t even talk about racist religion, like if you aren’t born that race, than you are not allowed to believe in this religion. I think these people are way to scare that there’s nothing after death so they waste their life praying…. DUDE’ THAT HAPPEN NOW, stfu, stop to pray and live your life, that happen NOW, and it’s your ONLY chance, get over death and live!
Yeah, I agree. Fuck religion!!!
hey your weird scumbags you fucking faggot i cant wait till u go to hell douchbags
And I can’t wait till you learn to spell common words.
Bye bye…
Kiss Kiss
kjmr52@gmail.com
You mean (you’re) a contraction that means you are. Also you spelled douche bags wrong, moron.
Oh, that happens every time Jack Abramoff surfs the web in prison. He should know better than that.
Wow…way to play the “faggot” card. So original.
Lol @ Kiss Kiss. Mark, I think you offended somebody–I wonder which hate promoting and/or child molesting group (KKK, Muslim, Baptist, or Catholic) s/he is a member of.
Pick one…any of the ones you have mentioned.
um
You have made some major generalisations! I can’t say that these images sit comfortably with me. I’m a youth minister that does not feel I need to push my beliefs onto other people. However, I do believe that the bible does teach alot about humility and social justice. People who read it without at least seeing that aspect have missed the bigger picture.
@ Mark I doubt 1 in 20 priests are kiddy fiddlers. Is that fact or another made up number?
Micah: 6:8 Do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with God.
In other words, you don’t like them.
Speaking my mind on a blog site hardly qualifies as pushing my beliefs on others.
“Bigger picture”??
Have any evidence of that “bigger picture”??
And no, I didn’t just make up that number regarding priests.
Why would you doubt my quote about priests?
http://www.religioustolerance.org/clergy_sex8.htm
Sorry, I’m not the one that believes in made up stories.
If that number is real then that is very sad.
Im not accusing you of pushing your beliefs onto others, but Im letting you know that I think it is wrong of people to tell non believers they are going to hell. My friend was put off from coming to youth group as a result of someone telling her that. It makes me really angry to think thats what some people do.
Did I mention anything about believeing in made up stories? I don’t believe that human rights is something that is made up. Like I said, anyone who has read it and did not see that aspect has missed the bigger picture.
I think it’s pretty obvious to who is telling the stories. Yeah, maybe it is wrong to push beliefs on others, but let’s not go around and tell people about ‘Stories’, it’s immature and dumb. Have you noticed at to all the people who have Jesus tend to be better civilans than the KKK.
Hahaha, it;s ridicolus at how you act!!!
Members of the KKK, no doubt, would insist that they have Jesus too!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
The bigger picture includes concepts of shalom, fairness, equality, relationship. I did give you evidence on that bigger picture. I can give you more…
http://www.umc-gbcs.org/atf/cf/%7B325AB72F-313E-4CC3-BB1A-EF0A52968A8D%7D/The_Bible_and_Social_Justice.pdf
don’t feel you have to read the whole thing. Even I think its a but long winded. Skim through. You will get my point.
The story of the good samaritan is another great example. Although not a litteral story it is definately is a teaching story used to teach about showing love and mercy for a neighbour. – Luke 10:25-37
Would you agree this has to do with human rights, relationship and social justice?
And the Bible also states that women are not to speak in church…compliments of Paul. The Bible also mentions how a slave is to be submissive to his master.
Where are the rights of humans in that?
If the Bible is “God’s word”, as I have heard so many times, then either the Bible is flawed or the inspiration is.
The Bible is full of literal and philosophical contradictions.
Anyone can justify almost anything using bit and pieces from it.
Here’s direct quote from Jesus…
Matthew 10:34 – “I come not to bring peace, but to bring a sword”
I am very sorry that the Bible didn’t make any commentary about whether it is permissible for men to fart in church but not women–perhaps for because of the possibility that women’s farts could be contaminated by menstrual blood.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
your taking a verse out of his context
EMI -XXXX-
@ Judy
Last Christmas, I went to a Catholic church while visiting my family. In the beginning of the mass, the minister started speaking of the love of God. About twenty minutes later he said that “we as Christians need to save the non-believers.” Perhaps I was shocked by this statement due to the fact that the church was in liberal San Diego. Perhaps it was my naivete. I don’t know why it struck a nerve the way it did. Later, we were supposed to kneel and pray. My mother and I, being Universalists, chose not to kneel. We were given all sorts of dirty looks from everyone in the church.
You did the right thing by not kneeling though.
quote about priests is only an estimate and cannot be confirmed…
However, it is still very sad.
And sadly, most anything in the Bible cannot be confirmed, but yet many believe in it and readily quote from it as some type of inspirational thought to an atheist or other non-Christians.
Another common misunderstanding is reading the bible and not taking into account the context and the time in which it was written. I don’t believe Matthew 10:34 to be a contradiction. This was ment to divide the people who had obscured the scriptures (especially the priests) and turned it into their own personal benefit of to fulfill their own selfish needs. It’s another story of social justice.
I don’t believe straight out that the bible is ‘God’s word.’ It was written by humans inspired by God. God did not actually write the bible himself.
Evidence suggests that there was a man that lived about 2000 years ago that caused a massive divide and created an uproar. I suggest you watch a program called ‘Son of Man.’ Evidence is presented in an objective manner.
I’m sorry you see this as being another inspiration thought. I am merely showing you the overarching humanitarian and social justice issues presented in the bible.
Humanism can be achieved without any religious stimuli or induction.
Just because atheists are Hellbound(according to the Bible), does not mean we are an immoral, broken group.
I celebrate this life, not an afterlife.
I also agree humanism can be achieved without any religious stimuli or induction. However I believe that it does add another dimension. I have adopted the Australian Aboriginal term of ‘Kanyini’ to explain my belief system. It is the relationship and connectness to all things, including a spiritual dimension that I believe you cannot get from anything else.
I also agree that atheism does not neccesarily mean immorality and or a broken group. As does religion not neccesarily mean morality.
And I also live for today. Life is such a celebration. To live for an afterlife is simply selfishness. If an afterlife exists Ill know when I die.
Thanks Mark. We have found common ground
Yes, there are common threads that link almost every group. .
Kanyini seems to be another form of pantheism.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
There is no way you or anyone else can verify or falsify the theory that the people who wrote the bible were divinely inspired, so the concept itself is simply meaningless.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
In other words…you don’t like it.
I wasn’t aware that any Christian Camp ever taught children to despise non-Christians.. whether you agree with religion in general or not, the whole point of Christianity is that you’re taught to love absolutely everyone, especially your enemies, non-believers etc, unlike in the qu’ran. Sure you have a few off-shoots like those godhatesfags people, but they have definitely misinterpreted a lot of things and are not Christians. And the KKK definitely aren’t either, just people trying to justify their violence with higher authority like throughout history. I think articles like this are too harsh and the author comes off looking worse than the religions to me, and have really got it wrong here, showing extremely troubled minority groups and people and applying that to the billions of decent honest religious people, a very shameful attack, what is it in the authors life that drives them to do that lol?
My intention was to point out how nutty adults use the power and influence of religion to fulfill their agendas of hate and selfishness.
The KKK is a Christian-based organization.
http://www.kkk.bz/
The God Hates Fags group are Christian-based also.
http://www.godhatesfags.com/
Just because you don’t like their message does not mean that they aren’t Christian. These folks claim to be just as much Christian(if not more) as you do.
Where is the line to be drawn when determining who or what “is not Christian”??
The Bible can be used to justify almost anything…good and bad.
Terrorists are people fighting against an established government that you DON’T like. Freedom fighters are people fighting against an established government that you DO like. Guerrillas are people fighting against an established government that you are unsure about.
Sexually titillating material that I like is EROTICA. Sexually titillating material that other people like is PORNOGRAPHY.
Judges that make decisions that I like are highly qualified and responsible jurists. Judges that make decisions that I don’t like are judicial activists who misread the Constitution.
People who belong to your own brand of Christianity are TRUE Christians, and they belong to the one true religion. People who belong to other brands of Christianity are not true Christians, and they belong to CULTS or FALSE RELIGIONS.
(I hope this explains things clearly.)
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Oh yes, and I want to add that Lake Erie is a clean, and lake Titicaca is a dirty.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
you can try in talk trash about Jesus by playing your blame game next you’ll probbley Obrak for being black. You game will only end in a loss of respect grow up and my you see that Jesus has always been there for you
I can “talk trash” about it because it’s pure BS.
By the way, I like Obama. His mother was an atheist and later his father became one.
I know one thing: When I was in a Lutheran parochial school (Missouri Synod) from the first to the third grade, we ere DEFinitely taught to hate Catholics.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Fuck, I meant to write “we were DEFinitely taught to hate Catholics.”
Harleigh, I love you, man. You never cease to crack me the fuck up.
Michael, the feeling is mutual! If you want to get in touch with me outside this group, my e-mail address is hkyson@gmail.com.
Harleigh
Michael, I think you would enjoy reading Paul Johnson’s book “Intellectuals.”
Every senior in high school or freshman in college should read this book. It will give them a healthy skepticism about their studies in the humanities and the social sciences by showing how many famous writers in these areas are really quite fucked up. (I myself started out in college in 1956 thinking that professors were gods and that everything they taught was valid.)
Johnson is a British historian and a Catholic. He once wrote an article in the “Reader’s Digest” defending his belief in the existence of God. He is also a political and social conservative, as a person would expect.
I still enjoy reading him. The first book of his I read was his history of the twentieth century, which I ran across by accident in a book store in Hollywood. He writes quite well, though at times he goes into so much detail in his historical narratives that he boggles the mind. This, however, I find to be a minor problem. (It is not a problem in “Intellectuals,” however.)
Harleigh
Yeah, I’ll definitely be in touch!
I started college thinking the same way but with two years in I’ve learned that most of the professors have biases.
Michael, at times I don’t check my e-mail too often. So if you think you have waited too long for my response after sending me an initial e-mail message, send me another one. Also, please mention this blog. I know several Michaels, and I don’t want to confuse you with another one I know.
Harleigh Kyson Jr (hkyson@gmail.com)
There is no way anyone can distinguish between the “true” version of a religion and a “false” one. It is obvious that you do not like the god-hates-fags Christians and the KKK; but when you say they are not “true” Christians, all you are really saying is that you don’t like them.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
What is this for an organisation? Do you organisize demonstrations against KKK and these radical religious groups or do you only speak via the internet about some themes?
Sry for my english, it is not the best, i am from germany…
my emailadress is: peter.nancke@gmx.de
Machen Sie sich keine Sorgen über Ihr Englisch. Sie schreiben es gut. Mit mehr Praxis, wird es sicher besser werden!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Oh my god…I FUCKING LOVE THIS hkyson guy!!!fuck man, you speak german. holy christ(not really im atheist) wow!!! wait…did you use a translator? please say no!!!
I studied German for two years in College, but I haven’t read or written it much since then. I used a translator to produce that text. I do remember German well enough, however, to know when the translator produces bad results. I then rephrase my English text until I produce reasonable results in the languages I am translating into.
I have also studied Latin and all of the Romance languages. In my blog, “Interlingua multilingue,” I use Google’s translator quite often as an editing tool. If I have a Portuguese text, for example, I will use Google to translate it into Spanish, and then I will edit Google’s Spanish translation myself until I find the text satisfactory.
I also use Google to produce English translations of all my foreign-language texts. I then edit Google’s English translations until they sound natural.
After producing Spanish and Portuguese versions of a text, I will at times use Google to translate them into French. To do this, I will often produce a French text using Spanish, Portuguese, and English input (Google often produces somewhat different results from each of these languages.
Google is a valuable translating and editing tool if you don’t use it naively. This means that you have to know your target languages well enough to be aware when Google’s translations are doing astray.
I am very lucky to have found an Italian guy who likes my work. He produces Italian versions of many of my posts for me. I would also like to get collaborators who speak French, Spanish, and Portuguese as native languages to vet my texts. In the meantime, I do the best I can.
Occasionally Google’s translator produces excellent results. I will upload here an example from one of my fairly recent “Interlingua multilingue” posts.
One of the URL’s for “Interlingua multilingue” is http://hkyson.wordpress.com.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
The quality of Google’s translations are often very good, but not perfect. To demonstrat this, I will reproduce below an article in French followed by its Google translation into English completely without any further revisions (Harleigh Kyson Jr.)
………
Allemagne : l’américain d’origine ukrainienne John Demjanjuk attend son procès à Munich
Les Etats-Unis ont expulsé en Allemagne John Demjanjuk, l’américain d’origine ukrainienne accusé par la justice allemande d’avoir été un garde dans le camp d’extermination nazi de Sobibor en Pologne. Demjanjuk, âgé de 89 ans, est officiellement inculpé de complicité dans le meurtre de 29 000 juifs. Son arrivée à Munich, ce mardi, met fin à plus de 30 ans d’efforts de la part des autorités américaines pour que l’intéressé rende enfin des comptes à la justice.
C’est la seconde fois que John Demjanjuk, qui continue à démentir avoir jamais été un garde dans un camp de concentration nazi, est expulsé par le gouvernement américain. La première fois avait été en 1986, après des années de manœuvres juridiques de la part de l’intéressé pour éviter d’être chassé des Etats-Unis, où il avait émigré en 1952.
En effet, très tôt après son arrivée dans le pays, les autorités américaines s’étaient rendues compte que John Demjanjuk avait menti dans ses déclarations aux services d’immigration et qu’il y avait de fortes chances qu’il ait été un garde dans un camp de concentration nazi. Mais Demjanjuk s’était battu bec et ongle pour rester aux Etats-Unis. Et le ministère de la justice avait dû s’investir pendant des années pour qu’il soit finalement expulsé en Israël en 1986.
Après un procès retentissant, un tribunal israélien avait identifié John Demjanjuk comme étant Ivan le Terrible, le garde sadique du camp de concentration nazi de Treblinka. Ce qui lui avait valu la peine capitale. Mais la Cour suprême israélienne a cassé la sentence suite à la découverte de nouvelles pièces à décharge laissant planer des doutes sur la véritable identité de John Demjanjuk.
Ce dernier est alors rentré aux Etats-Unis en 1993. D’où la reprise des efforts des autorités américaines pour l’expulser vers l’Allemagne cette fois-ci. John Demjanjuk et sa famille ont de nouveau résisté avec acharnement, invoquant notamment la mauvaise santé de l’accusé. Mais le ministère de la justice, encouragé par de nouveaux documents établissant sans presque l’ombre d’un doute que Demjanjuk avait été un garde dans le camp de concentration de Sobibor, n’ont pas jeté l’éponge. Ce qui a conduit au résultat final de ce mardi : l’arrivée de l’accusé à Munich où son procès devrait commencer à une date ultérieure non précisée.
Pour mémoire, John Demjanjuk a commencé la seconde guerre mondiale dans l’armée soviétique. Capturé par les allemands en 1942, il aurait été formé par les SS dans le camp spécial de Trawniki établi pour les étrangers participant à l’holocauste des Juifs. Demjanjuk dément. Il soutient avoir été un prisonnier de guerre pendant le conflit.
—
Germany: American Ukrainian John Demjanjuk is awaiting trial in Munich
The United States deported to Germany John Demjanjuk, the Ukrainian-born American accused by the German court of being a guard in the Nazi extermination camp Sobibor in Poland. Demjanjuk, 89 years old, is officially charged with complicity in the murder of 29 000 Jews. His arrival in Munich on Tuesday, ended more than 30 years of effort by the U.S. authorities to finally make the person accountable to justice.
This is the second time that John Demjanjuk, who continues to deny ever having been a guard in a Nazi concentration camp, was deported by the U.S. government. The first time was in 1986, after years of legal maneuvers by the person to avoid being expelled from the United States, where he emigrated in 1952.
Indeed, very soon after his arrival in the country, U.S. authorities had realized that John Demjanjuk had lied in his statements to immigration authorities and that there was a strong chance that he was a guard in a Nazi concentration camp. But Demjanjuk had fought tooth and nail to stay in the United States. And the Department of Justice had been involved for years, he was finally deported to Israel in 1986.
After a trial, an Israeli court had identified John Demjanjuk as Ivan the Terrible, the sadistic guard of Nazi concentration camp of Treblinka. This earned him the death penalty. But the Israeli Supreme Court quashed the sentence following the discovery of new exculpatory documents raised doubts about the true identity of John Demjanjuk.
The latter is then returned to the United States in 1993. Hence the renewed efforts of U.S. authorities to deport him to Germany this time. John Demjanjuk and his family were again fiercely resisted, citing in particular the poor health of the accused. But the Ministry of Justice, encouraged by new documents proving almost without doubt that Demjanjuk was a guard in the concentration camp of Sobibor, have not thrown in the towel. This led to the outcome of today: the arrival of the accused in Munich where his trial should begin at a later unspecified date.
For the record, John Demjanjuk began the Second World War in the Soviet army. Captured by the Germans in 1942, he was trained by the SS in the special camp at Trawniki established for foreigners involved in the Holocaust of the Jews. Demjanjuk denies. He claims to have been a prisoner of war during the conflict.
I see both sides of the religion arguement, and am personally undecided. I think it isn’t religion itself that is evil, but the conatations that certain people give it. But, I am a former Christian, so I know they also preach certain things to people. I believe that with the right words, you can change the world…and with the wrong ones, you can destroy it. With or without religion, I was instilled with good values and positive role models (none of whom are religious) and I believe THAT is what made me a better person. I know that I am above degrading other people’s religious choices. Whether Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Pagan, Atheist, etc., we all share this same earth. I think its important to remember that no matter what, we’re all connected.
I think religion can be good or bad. I am agnostic yet it is nice to think that there is a possability of eternal “salvation”. Either way religion isn’t bad. Its just a word used to explain “different” beliefs. In the end they all mean the same thing-Be a good person and love others, Take care of the weaker ones. Atheist could be considered a religion.It is the belief that there is “no god” yet some will believe in the same ethic values and morals. We are all connected either way.
Atheism is not a religion, no matter how you attempt to connect it. Many religious folks share the same ethics with atheists.
The thing that makes religion ultimately bad is that the comfort it offers to people–especially about life after death–is deceptive.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Look, art, the problem with religion is that many of its practitioners are very nasty people who do very bad things. This is what makes religion itself utterly detestable.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
people always believe what they want to believe. There is no right or wrong-only consequences.
your interpretation of anything is merely that-your interpretation.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/7994131.stm
Image 5 is just the flip side of the KKK garb.
There’s a great special on the KKK from the History Channel. It shows just how young they start Indoctrinating these kids…
They show a baby in full cloak and hood.
At first I laughed then I got really sick to my stomach.
We must know the purpose of our life .why we are Created and what is the aim behind our Creation?
If we apply our mind and think about the nature of World we can realize there is
a Creator to everything to all universe.
And we should be grateful to him by worship only that Almighty God.
This is the humble invitation to a truth, which is revealed By God to the total mankind. Prophet Muhammad(peace be up on Him) revealed as before on prophets Moses(Mosa),Jesus(Isa) and other prophets(peace be up on Him).But now only 100%existing religion in this world is Isalm.And only purely 100%existing revelation in this world is Holy Quran. All other revelations are corrupted.
Islam is a total submission and worship to only Allah-almighty/only god/our Creator, creator of universe,self-sufficient,Master,whom all creatures need.
Islam is a “make believe” load of crap too.
Islam and Christianity…both religions are invasive, destructive and promises it’s believers all kinds of eternal rewards.
The only thing humans can count on regarding Islam and Christianity…more war and destruction.
Dude,
We are just here to keep our race (the human one) surviving.
In suggesting that we worship one god you imply that there are other gods. Making “One True God” a misnomer.
If anyone applies his/her mind and only his/her mind (not the minds of idiots who pass down myths) they will find no evidence for a “creator.”
You’re right about one thing. Islam (and ALL religion) is a submission. But, not to god but to people (caliph, pope, etc.) who only want to dominate the world.
Our only salvation is freedom from submission to these people and thinking for ourselves.
Peace be upon YOU.
As the members of the Golden Shower Christian Church would say, “Piss on you!”
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
To say there is no God is to say there is no reason to live. That just doesn’t add up everything has a beggining and has a end. God created up for good but it are sinful nature that stops us from seeing the truth
So…you’re saying that an atheist should commit suicide?
That’s about the stupidest thing I have ever read.
Looks like I’m a little late to the party. “To say there is no God is to say there is no reason to live?” What? Okay, I’ll live for God. I’ll spend my whole life doing what someone else says is right so when I DIE I get into heaven or paradise or whatever you want to call it. I’d rather live for life than death.
Also Dude,
All the religions and revelations exist 100%.
They are also 100% FALSE.
We were not created. We simply evolved over millions of years from single-celled organisms like other plants and animals.
Life is an insignificant epiphenomenon in the universe. It has no purpose other than to reproduce itself.
(“Insignificant epiphenomenon” means that, compared to stars and planets, there is an insignificant amount of biomass in the universe.)
The individual purposes that we give to life are simply artifacts of our own invention. The universe is utterly indifferent to whether we live or die. This, by the way, is what Sartre meant by being “condemned to freedom.”
We all could be easily killed off in, say, two or three centuries, if we were hit by a big enough asteroid in that gigantic circular billiard-balls game in the sky that is our solar system.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
I think it is quite ironic that most people on this blog tell how religion is a hate mongering thing when all you have said here is how you hate religion, so look into a mirror and you will most likely see the origin of most problems, also look at the 10 Commandments, most are not only religious laws but also are common laws too, no killing, no adultery, respect your parents don’t lie or steal. These are not just “religious mindlessness” but are laws that people should follow no matter their creed.
Just proof that morality is universal.
The Ten Commandments are morally deficient. They tell children to honor their parents, but they don’t tell parents not to abuse their children.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Hi Sam,
I just wanted to point out to you that in the right upper corner of this blog Mark has posted a disclaimer. I will repost it here for you:
“WARNING: If this blog offends you, you need to leave. There will be blasphemy of your gods and mocking of your scripture and rituals.”
Please do not generalize as there are some Atheists who respect religion when that religion deserves respect. In the same manner, it would be nice if some religious people would respect those Atheist who deserve respect. One should not judge the person by their beliefs but by their actions and words.
As for the 10 Commandments, I believe firmly that religion was developed in order to provide some control over the people. Constantine recognized that when he accepted Christianity on his deathbed in order to get the people to accept Christianity and come together. A result of that was the incorporation of rules, regulations, and laws within the religion. Much like stories that my father would tell me about why I should obey my mum or the bodach would take me away. Religion is the same in that manner. One needs to obey the rules or they will go to hell.
No generalizations are worth anything, including this one, and the present king of France is bald.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Look, if you have been on the receiving end of Christian hatred the way I have been as a gay guy all my life, you get fucking MAD at these assholes!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
If you are any kind of “different” the religionists hate you.
I won’t be a silent spectator as they keep non-Christians from public office. I won’t shut the hell up when they push their religious rules and dogma into public schools. I won’t close my eyes and mouth when they espouse hatred against homosexuals and I bloody well won’t stand still while they try to legislate it. I won’t whimper c’est la vie when they vandalize my car or threaten my life.
This country is full of Christian outlaws. Their morality is self-aggrandizement and hatred of the outclan. Religion has killed their empathy and inflated their self-esteem with delusions of grandeur. They are vandals on the fabric of society, an ever flowing fountain of hatred.
Yet when we say they are wrong to accept molesting clergy or wrong to let their children die, when we say they are wrong to attack us physically, psychologically, and financially or when we say we won’t accept their religious laws – we are oppressing them. Objecting to their misbehavior is seen as hate mongering.
Calling out injustice is not hate mongering. It’s only like yelling, “Stop, thief!” when someone lifts your wallet.
You don’t seem to understand, Sam, that when Christians hate me and do everything possible to make my life miserable because I am gay, it is only a natural response to hate them back.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Laws that people SHOULD follow, but look around this demented slaughterhouse of a world we live in. They’re just slowing people down.
I suppose that is ironic on some haughty philosophical level, but it seems to me that the Atheists are merely reacting to the hate mongering of the religious types. Newton’s Third Law, if you will. For every action there is an equal, opposite reaction. Maybe if religious types would respond with love, they’d get love in return. A crazy idea for a modern world, I know.
Besides! Don’t religious people think mirrors are tools of the Devil?
American people suck but not oboma he is the best
btw canada is the best fucking country in the wourld.all u americans are retarted trying to piss off outher countrys and then getting in a fucking war.
ameriacan people can go to hell !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WTF mate???
I was wondering about your education. Not to be rude but your spelling and grammar is very poor. I thought that Canada had some good schools up there but maybe I was mistaken.
I would also like to point out that you need to differentiate between people and government. Just because a government dictates certain things or acts in a certain way, that does not mean that the people approve of the government’s actions. The people in the U.S. get to vote for the President but once he is in office, we have little control over what he does. The only way that we exert control is by voting the President out of office when it is time to vote. That occurs every four years. Of course, if what he does is grievous enough, we can impeach him.
I am sorry that you obviously have had a hard time with ’some’ Americans. Please do not generalize. Not all Americans will fit your idea of what an American is like. Some of us may surprise you.
As for hell, I do not believe in it.
May we burn with you, my brother from the north…
This blog is focused on religion and not at all with nationality. To realize that, all you had to do was look at the pictures above and read the captions. It’s just like reading Dr. Seuss. Look at the pictures and sound the words out. As for your spelling and grammar, both are equally atrocious. Shall I loan you my three-year-old cousin’s Speak & Spell? I feel you would benefit greatly. Perhaps you would learn from the stimulation of a monotone voice helping you spell a simple word like “countries” correctly. I will end my response with a statement that even you will understand. Have your Speak & Spell ready… D-I-P-S-H-I-T. Say it. Dipshit.
Spoken like a true forgive and forget Christian.
Canada is a nice country and all, but remember: they gave us Tom Green, too…
Why would you even go there?
Canada and the United States are different countries with different cultures.
Neither is better than the other, as both have their strengths and weaknesses.
Also, we heavily rely on each other for economic purposes.
Plus most Canadians would be bored without American media (TV, magazines, movies.. etc).
Don’t get me wrong though, I do love my home and native land.
Canada is better than the United States. Australia and New Zealand are better than Canada. Holland, and Denmark, Sweden and Norway are even better.
Of all of them, I wish I had been born in Denmark. I was born in 1938. If I were born in Copenhagen instead of Los Angeles, I would probably have survived World War II and would have had a much happier life growing up.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Hi Mark – Nice place you’ve got here.
Could help but notice that many people read the word ‘Religion’ as ‘Christian/Christianity’ .. I guess we go with what we know. But we need to remember that it includes all the Eastern religions (Hinduism/Sikhism etc) and the tribal religions of Africa. I personally group the 3 dominant middle eastern religions of Judism, Islam and Christianity as ‘Judeo-Christianity’. They all contain the same mythology but have differing contemporary takes on it.
Not sure where the Canada stuff comes in tho ….
…. And judging by your avatar you look like the Milf-Hunter! Way to go Mark!
When people think of religion in the United States, they tend to equate it with Christianity, because the majority of Americans say they are Christians, and Christians are responsible for most religious oppression in this country.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
You are so ignorant. You judge. Your basicly “judging a book by its cover”. Less then 1% of priests are pedophiles. Go learn something & do something productive with your time. I hope you get hit by a bus. Actually i would very like that. Or i hope the KKK come and tracks you down. That would be GREAT. Its too bad god forgives cause i wouldnt mind if you went to hell. And you probably googled “priest” and you ASSUMED he was a pedophile. If i saw your picture i would ASSUME the same exact thing.
You hope I get hit by a bus????
You hope the KKK tracks me down???
Do I deserve to be stoned or crucified also?
Thank you for confirming my definition of “Christian hypocrisy”.
I really hope English isn’t your first language.
Hmmm? And you are not judging in your post?
The fact of the matter is that the majority of Atheist are very intellectual. They spend many, many hours everyday reading about the latest news in science, politics, etc. If you would just open up your mind, you would learn something on this site or the many other Atheist sites that you didn’t know before. Some of that will be in regards to your religion or the Bible as it is well known that most Atheist have read the Bible cover to cover at least once or twice and have studied it over and over again.
As for doing something productive, there are many Christian sites on the internet. Would you tell them the same thing or do you only reserve that to those who discuss the controversies inherent within religion? I also have to ask what is so productive about sitting in church and listening to the same sermon that is given over and over again each year?
Would God absolve your wishing death on another? But as you said, “God forgives.” The grace of the damned is the caress of a blade in their side when death claims them in the end. Perhaps YOU are the ignorant one. But I’m sure that God’s charity will allow both yourself and Mark into “heaven.” Have a nice day.
Hey! That’s the infamous hate post! I especially like the line “Its too bad god forgives cause i wouldnt mind if you went to hell.” This explains the popularity of the Left Behind series. You would think when people do get to Heaven, they’d have plenty of time for chit chat with their fellow angels. Even if they’re just a little bit different. Just think of it as a really really long plane trip. That never ends. With harps and wings.
You know what, I just noticed that the Caucasian boy in the third picture is holding the hand of the African-American boy/girl (unable to tell). There was a time when such a thing would have been considered an abomination to God because people of color were seen as being lesser than those who were Caucasian in many Christian religions. Even today, mixed marriages are still forbidden in some Christian religions. Obviously, some religions have progressed and some have not.
I find the one that is noted as being a card interesting. About five years ago, I had a boss who found out that I was not Christian. She did not know I was Atheist, just that I was not Christian. How she found out, I do not know. At any rate, I began to get Christian cards in my work mailbox from her. Most stated in one way or other that if I did not repent and accept Christ as my savior, I would go to hell. I filled a harassment suit and won. She was transferred to a lesser position and I was able to pay my bills off. While in court, I was asked what religion I was. If my boss could have thrown daggers out of her eyes, I think she would of then when I stated I was Atheist. I guess that is lower than any other religion. At least in my Aunts book it is.
I know god made humans to worship hiim. God is not jesus christ. He is a MAN who had a message which was to worship god. Why would people ever think that… God is a power that never dies… Jesus christ died…Someone…plz try to explain that to me.. Why is the sky not falling. Which sort of power is holding it up…if that power was dead…wouldn the sky have collapsed on us…PEOPLE…MAKE SENSE TO WAT U WRITE..TRULY YOU ARE MISTAKEN…gays are not morally correct…what do you expect…The human body was made for a man and woman to be together…if it wasnt why wouldnt god have put an extra hole on a man who was gay or gave a package to a woman who was attracted to woman…so is it wrong for people to despise what Allah said was wrong..learn about life…All praise is due to allah the most graciuos the most mercifull……the truth is always hated and therefore the truthful people are always hated…muslims…
hafsa out
I think Harvey Milk said it best: two gay men can’t reproduce, but Lord knows it doesn’t stop ‘em from trying!
A shame too because hafsa’s message starts out so hopeful. Personally, I think it’s intelligent design. What’s the point of having a whole separate set of genitalia for gay people only? Something else to find strangely attractive. Too complicated. Nature favors elegant simplicity.
Uh, a lot of us don’t try to reproduce by fucking. Many of us confine ourselves to sucking cock or beating off.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Oh, c’mon, Harleigh. A good joke is a good joke. Besides, Jesus wasn’t nailed on a cross 2000 years ago so that you could confine yourself to sucking cock and beating off. Get out there and sow some wild oats, man! You’re in the state of Californication, for no God’s sake!
I was just trying to state that not all of us fuck each other in the ass. There are other equally satisfying methods of getting off.
I don’t think that Jesus’s existence or non existence or his possible crucifixion or the possibility that his crucifixion was a hoax had anything to do with my sexual orientation and my favorite ways of getting off.
If I had ever REALly gotten to like getting fucked in the ass, I would have caught AIDS and died a long time ago.
Harleigh
“the truth is always hated and therefore the truthful people are always hated”
Must be way religious people hate atheists.
As for gays and lesbians and other alternative genders not to be listed here, in nature, animals are not ’straight’. Ever watch cows in a field? They are lesbian. Monkies? Homosexual. (And they are our closest relatives) There are many other examples but you can look them up for yourself. It stands to reason, then, that homosexuality is not unnatural at all.
“Must be why religious people hate atheists. ”
I guess we’re party poopers.
i think that true christians dont hate anyone, they love everyone, i think youve seen soome people poseing to be christrians, not real ones if that is your opinion of them,
On what planet have you been residing?
Once again we are faced with that line of hoary line of crap that it is possible to distinguish between “real” and “false” versions of a religion or “true” and “false” prophets.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Just go with the premise. Let’s break it down into its component parts:
True christians don’t hate anyone.
False christians like only other false christians.
Which I guess leaves the rest of us. Oh Jesus, protect me from your followers, true or otherwise.
“I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
-Voltaire
I quote Voltaire as I agree only partially with the ideas presented here. I do agree, religious extremism is a parasite that feeds off of the minds of children. Ergo, the first, second, and fourth pictures are nothing short of chilling. However, when religion preaches love and practices what it preaches, it can be an uplifting and beautiful thing, the very thing that set a code of basic laws and moral human conduct (shall not kill, steal, etc.) Please note that I as well have grown dismayed with the destruction extremism causes and consequently do not hesitate to call myself an atheist. I commend you, Mark, on a job well done. It is refreshing that we as educated people can come together and discuss sensitive issues in a civilized manner. Disregarding the comments of blind faith made by a few…
All the best quotes don’t have the word Jesus in them.
Yes, that is true.
This is exactly what I realized some time ago, I don’t remember exactly when anymore, but religion is really for the kids. I forget what Easter represents: something about Jesus’s blood? And yet, how do we go from that to a bunny rabbit and Easter eggs? No one knows… okay, someone smarter than me knows. All I know is I did one of those easter egg hunts once, and didn’t find a damn egg, which brought a kid like me to tears.
But the main thing is that I believe kids need certain things to help build identity. Public school just might be one of them; I think the jury’s still out on home schooling. But that’s just me. Some people think Sunday school is the answer to building kids’ identities. It certainly might explain the anger certain Xians feel when they come here and begin to realize that everything that’s been drilled into their heads when they were so young is nothing but a big steaming pile of Holy Shit. And I for one am not going to be some pathetic old man in his eighties going to church every Sunday, waving my giant Jesus pennant and perpetrating that big lie.
The bunnies and eggs of Easter are the Christians’ pathetic (but successful) attempt to convert people of tribal councils to Christianity. The icons of nature come from the Pagan ceremony, the Equinox. Christians wanted Pagans to embrace Christianity and incorporated Pagan symbols into the religion. That is where the bunnies of Easter, the Yule log at Christmas, and the idea that Jesus was born on December 25th (even though he was actually born in the summer). These were the days before the Jehovahs walked from door to door handing out religious pamphlets.
CHRISTIANS DID NOT TRY TO CONVERT PEOPLE BY MAKING UP BUNNIES AND EGGS YOU RETARD OF A PERSON CALLED MEL MIKHAILOV!!!!!!!!!!!! THOSE OTHER NONCHRISTIANS DID!!!!!!!!!!! SO SHUT-UP AND GET YOUR FACTS STRAIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
BTW STEVE HARVEY IS RIGHT YOU HAVE NO MORALS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Is your Caps Lock stuck or is that just regular ole brain lock?
Ah, the joys of a simple mind. I may not know you personally, FD (nor do I wish to), but It’s fairly easy to tell that you are unintelligent. “SO SHUT-UP AND GET YOUR FACTS STRAIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” (“Shut up” is not hyphenated, by the way.) All of the references to nature in Christian traditions are based off of Paganism. Why would they incorporate references to nature unless they were trying to appeal to the Pagans?
“Nature herself has imprinted on the minds of all the idea of God.”
-Cicero
Where do you think this comes from?
Why am I immoral? Because I know the truth? That my ancestors (Christians, Jews, Muslims, Shinto, and Pagans) were persecuted for their beliefs in science, nature, and religion? That I as an American have freed myself from the holy shackles my people were born into? Christians (and all theistic religions) try to convert people. Have you heard of the Crusades? The Spanish Inquisition? Or am I immoral simply because my morals do not match your own?
Respond to this comment, FD. Give me a follow-up. Ignoring this comment will prove to me how stupid you truly are.
Have a nice day.
-Mel Mikhailov
Guess it was just a hit-and-run blogging Christian. Their mind exploded.
Looks like it. I don’t know why, but it strikes me as pretty funny.
Yeah, you can’t help but laugh. Plus, you can tell how angry they are from the number of exclamation points.
J’ai honte de vous. Comment des gens aussi cons peuvent exister
I think maybe you have misunderstood.
Cet article est de comment les RELIGIONS utilisent leur Dieu pour détruire et établir une discrimination.
C’est vous qui êtes un con!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Et tous les chrétiens sont des Crétins!
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
Je voulais écrire “crétins” au lieu de “Crétins”.
Harleigh Kyson Jr.
“This group teaches children how to pray and how to despise non-Christians by using the “you’re going to Hell” card.”
That “card” is not used to despise, it’s used like this, “You’re going to hell, but I don’t want you there. I want you in heaven with me, because I love you and don’t want to lose you. That’s why you need Jesus.” Just because you don’t believe what Christians believe doesn’t mean that you have to portray us as non-Christian haters.
You guys all are retared and if i see this i will get your ip and come and kill u
Maybe you should threaten the religious groups that are mentioned in the article…..NOT THE MESSENGER.
Bullshit. Will you next attribute Stalin’s mass murders to atheism, just because he was an atheist? Idiotic list. Just because KKK exists, doesn’t mean it’s every christians’ fault. Or that every christian hate homosexuals.
Racism, terrorism, prejudice, pedophilia etc can be more likely attributed to human nature than religion.
Each group represented are part of a religion.
Does the article include ALL Christians? NO.
Reading is fundamental.
Twisting and spinning is a fun park activity. Try Disneyland.
Very well, I will READ thoroughly.
First, a general statement:
“This is what religion does…………”
Then follows a number of extremist groups. The KKK, “Jihadists” aka terrorists, people who teach children how to pray.
Apparently all religious people hate homosexuals. Apparently all religious people hate everyone outside of their religion. Atheists don’t, right? ;p
And apparently religious parents are willing to submit their children to pedophile priests. Apparently all priests are pedophiles, all parents are aware of the ‘probability of them being pedophiles’, etc. It’s not like there aren’t pedophiles that aren’t priests. Teachers have been known to be pedophiles. Maybe we shouldn’t send our children to school.
Rather than blame my reading skills I’d say you need to improve your article. It’s faaaar too general and you can hardly attribute most of these things solely to religion. Once again I say this.
For one, racism is NOT a religious phenomenon. Plenty of atheists are racist. Plenty of racist groups have no religious ties what-so-ever. Most religious groups have no racist ties what-so-ever. And even if some of their members are racists, it doesn’t mean the religion is.
And what do you mean by common threads? Maybe I should stop replying here, I only get nonsense in return. There are ties throughout all of society to all types of groups.
Absolutely correct! Atheists can be racists. Religious background may have nothing to do with it.
You said “plenty of atheists are racist”. Okay….how do you know this? What is the value of plenty?
no matter where you go there it is, there is no refuge from racism
Man, EvilTomte got you on that one. I really expected alittle better answer from you Mr.Athiest. But he’s got a point about Stalin. Where as Hitler, who was religious, murdured many people….So did Stalin, an athiest. So please explain……..
Stalin was indeed a very inhumane and power hungry dictator. No doubt about that.
What proof do you have that Stalin committed his crimes because he was an atheist?
I would like to hear your argument about how Stalin committed his crimes in the name of atheism.(Quotes from Marx are not applicable since he was dead during Stalin’s reign)
I will give one simple reason why Stalin committed his crimes, to consolidate political power.
Furthermore, this article does not generalize about Christians or Muslims. It refers to specific groups and these groups openly declare the wills of Jesus, God or Allah are being done through them.
I’m not Mark (obviously), but the answer really ought to be obvious. Perhaps he was just tired of repeating himself on this point? I’ve had to repeat it dozens upon dozens of times, so if I come off as a bit snarky just chalk it up to frustration.
Ok, so first of all, you have to go to motivation. Now maybe Stalin, Hitler, Pope Innocent, Pol Pot and every other horrible dictator ever were all primarily motivated by greed, power, that sort of thing. In fact, let’s say that they all had identical motivation just for simplicity’s sake. Now ask yourself, “but how did they sell it to the people?” That is where the difference lies. No one, up to and including Stalin justified his evil regime by saying “hey, I’m doing this because I believe I am working in the name of No Evidence for God! And No Evidence for God wants me to do this, so it is right and just of me! Therefore, if you go against my regime, you are displeasing Lack of Evidence, and will burn in a pit of Nasty Scientific Chemical Concoctions forever! Of course that can’t happen until after we torture you in prison until you accept Lack of Evidence into your heart. Because No Evidence really, truly loves you and wants you to be happy.”
Hitler, OTOH, justified his reign of terror like this:
And this:
If a crazy girl shoots up an elementary school and says she did it because “I don’t like Mondays,” her religious views don’t come into play. If a crazy guy shoots up an army base shouting “Allahu Akbar,” we’ve got a different story going on here.
Hope that helps.
why the hell would you teach CHILDERN this type of shit everyone has the right to be alive everyone mother fucking deservies respect and the african americans of today and the past have already been through a lot and u dont need to make them feel bad about there race what if u were a black well fuck to u cuz that is what they feel like every single day i am as white as it gets and i dont walk down the street screaming NIGGA! im not sure if that is what it is all about but i strongly disagree to what u r doing but by the looks of it it seems u HAte black people and non-christians.
Are you reading in reverse?
Atheism IS non-Christian.
“Religious Fun Groups” is an article aimed at the hypocrisies in Christianity and Islam.
Reading is fundamental. Have an adult explain this article to you.
You can take any religion and spin it for your own purposes and/or objectives.
Hitler used the ideals of Christianity to justify his persecution of the Jews. The ideals of Christianity was even used to justify slavery. It was the Roman Catholic Pope who signed the Western Atlantic Slave Treaty. All those slave owners were Church going Christians. The followed the so called religion of peace, love, acceptance and tolerance yet blacks were not allowed to sit in the Church with them.
Religion goes hand in hand with the bases of power: Politics, Wealth, Military capacity etc.
That is until they started making law for blacks to have their own churches that would be supervised . This insured that the slaves wouldn’t continue to practice their own “heathen”beliefs. Cant be bothered to find you a link but if you are truly interested , you’ll find it.
I totally disagree with this treatment towards childrenand it is disgusting and this group of people should be disgrased with themselves
were you to dis to kids????
It’s called sarcasm.
Mark. I love your message board. It finally gives a place for atheists, or just plain non-believers, to vent their feelings about religion. Personally I don’t believe in a God, per se, but I do believe that there are forces in our universe beyond our understanding. Thanks for giving us a place where we can be ourselves. And I agree. READING IS FUNDAMENTAL! =D
Well Dylan, you should come by more often. Hope to see ya again.
Everybody has the right to believe anything they want. And you know what else bugs me? That the word “atheist” means “someone who is not religious.” In my opinion, the definition should be changed to “a logical thinker.” Who agrees?
all religions and all beliefs have their flaws… we should try living by this motto…..
we were somehow placed on this earth, breath the same air bleed the same color, and will turn to dust at the end of our days so lets at least live together in a tolerant manner….
i believe in the elements wind fire earth water and spirit, the symbol of the pentagram aka pennicle. they make up the world we live in. revive paganism……
I’m proud to say I’m Catholic. I was brought up that way and just about everyone in my family is, there is a few that aren’t and I love them just as much as the rest that are.
I have never been though that if you dont believe in God or Jesus or if you are not a Catholic or christian you would go to hell. Thats a bunch of BS, that’s also stereotyping.
I do believe that there is a Heaven and a Hell. I think that if you are a good person, no matter what religion you are you will go to heaven. But if your a bad person throughout your life and not regret or dont feel the least bit bad about the bad things you’ve done then yes maybe you do deserve to go to hell.
This whole blog is an abamination of christianity, the white race, and the ku klux klan…who the fuck puts “proud atheist” then puts one of God’s children kkklad in kkk grab? friggin’ idiots…nathan bedford forrest would be ashamed…i hope you trip to judgement is rocky and long
I think you misunderstood the article. This article is making fun AT these organizations.
The KKK IS a Christian organization.
(Where did these folks that comment go to school?)
Mark,
it’s all well and done that one can point out everyone’s mistakes. By doing that you don’t get anywhere and will never. It’s quite clear that you have a hate on believe systems and just so much the people who believe in them.
You know instead of pointing the finger and not being able to solve anything, rather try to see how you can fix the problem by not making it worst. I have to agree to the fact that there is bad people in our world, but Christianity is about realizing that we are not perfect and there is someone who is willing to forgive you for your mistakes in life and that He will make you a new person striving to be bring good to this world. Now this doesn’t give anyone the right to still do bad. Not at all.
But if you say that you are perfect and that you have never done anything that you have not seek forgiveness for, You will be not telling the truth.
everyone slips up, but as long as you learn form your mistakes
and use them to improve. You are an improvement in the process.
I get that there are groups of people who stand together in the world with different believes and all. But I never really understood atheism. I mean you say you don’t believe in anything, yet it takes a lot of faith and believe to convince yourself that there’s no higher power than yourself. So you see Mark we all have our own believes.
We as Christians believe in a better place than Earth. We believe in a savior called Jesus. You know, one thing I have learned now is that People will always let you down, but Jesus won’t. Do yourself a favor and do some reading on believes before you start criticizing people.
Please don’t get me wrong I am not trying to say you bad here in front of all your friends. Just saying, try to love people for who they are and not for who they are not.
So maybe here is something that you can wrap around mind around…
Jesus never made Christians out of men, He made Disciples out of them. And He also didn’t say those who want to be his disciple should put up their hand, he said get up and follow me.
May you also experience His love.
Blessings
t
Sorry, like I’ve said countless times, “I’m not into zombies.”
Believing in zombies and drinking blood like vampires is your right. Who am I to deny you of fiction?
By the way….
Here’s a little advice. Most atheists already know the Jesus story and many are well versed in the Biblical fables.
Your witnessing to us is futile and we don’t give a shit whether you approve or not of our atheism.
You are the one with the problem of delusional beings. We are free of that condition.
You’re right! You don’t understand atheism. Case closed. Next!
Groups like the kkk and the extremist islamic groups do not believe in a god. they believe in a book. no god created the torah or the bible or the quran, people did. i do believe in things like evolution, but as well did it ever occur to you that there must be some other greater power that is moving the strings around to create everything in our lives. if you believe that groups like the kkk, believe in god, then you are just as nuts as them. for example, the jews believe that on the eighth day of birth for males, they should be circumcised. if you have ever seen a baby get circumcised then you would know that it is wrong. you atheists believe in pro choice but at what cost, ruining a childs life. what has a child ever done to deserve this. or when muslims use the quran as their excuse to bomb israelis. it is true, the israelis took their land. and christian who want to force their beliefs on everyone even if it kills them. i am not saying that any one of those religions is better than each other, but what i am saying is that they are being misguided into doing things that they wouldnt do if they knew what the right thing to do was. i do not believe in the organized religions that they have today because i believe that anything that has to many rules is just a way of people trying control what you do. there is a god out there, but he is not in any religion. where do you think that extra little push to get you through what ever it is comes from, science and the facts about the human body are not the key. god is giving you this push. try once to pray at night, thank, and you dont even have to say god, the higher power that is out there for getting you through the day and thank the higer power for being able to live day by day. have faith that there is a higher power out there and sure enough, even if you cant physically see it, you will find it. take care
What makes you think that? Many atheists are Pro Life also.
NEWSFLASH!!!! Most likely Jesus was circumcised, since the commandment to circumcise is given at Gen. 17:10-14 and Lev. 12:3. The covenant was originally made with Abraham. It is the first commandment specific to the Jews.
ok god loves all of you and he forgives you for all saying that rude stuff i am a christian and i don’t know why we force our religion on others. whos to say that our religion is right and there’s is wrong
but i do have faith in my god and i do believe that christ did die on the cross for our sins and there were many times were i have doubted my faith but hey im just human
and are you guys racist ?? thats just mean I can see Mexicans but leave black people alone . Alot of them have good educations and do make the right decisions dont base the whole race off of one person .
This article is about religion-sponsored racism. On what planet do you live?
And did you go to school to learn that grammar?
To whom are you replying to?
Simply adding to your reply to lucy. Should be obvious since you don’t have excruciating run on sentences or loads of grammatical error. Don’t boot me please!
Those run-on sentences are pretty irritating.
god is coming and i must warn u it wont be pretty if your not a beliver than yur just going to hell im going 2 sugar coat it 4 u n if u think im wrong well im not.Some of u wen 2 church like me you’ll know this stuff but some of u dont 4 me 2 be 11 going on 12 i sure do know a whole lot more than some of u adult’s. So if u belive in god thx n if u dont well i guess i wont be seeing u in hell holloween is evil.
It’s a good thing for you that literacy isn’t a sin.
…I’m not going to pick a fight with you, Shayla, because if I understood you correctly, you’re younger than me. (Not by a lot, though.) But I digress. “God” isn’t coming. He’s just the protagonist of the fairy tale book called the Bible. As for knowing more than some of these adults, half of them are God-fearing idiots who live their lives cowering before a mythical, powerful being who has allowed chaos to tear the world apart. I’ve come to respect some of the minds here. And about 99 percent of them are atheist. It sounds like the adults in your community are poisoning your malleable young mind. Break free. You can do it.
One more thing… Halloween is not evil. The original Halloween, Samhain, is a beautiful Pagan ceremony I’ve celebrated for years. Christian leaders perverted the holy ceremony of Samhain as propaganda and attempted (and succeeded) to instill fear of the Pagans’ ways into Christians’ minds. Halloween’s frightening white ghosts represent the Pagan worship of ancestral spirits. Scary, ugly old witches represent those who practice Paganism/Wicca. The jack-o-lanterns make a mockery of the fall season’s harvest.
Do some research. When we get older, people of our generation will be running the world. We need to think for ourselves. We can’t allow a preacher to think for us and tell us what to believe.
God is coming. Maybe before or after 2012, who noes. The only thing i want to say is that don’t criticize anybody, and never say there is no God. If you say there is no God, then its the same thing as saying humans came from monkeys.
You mean “Jesus is coming”? Tell him that I’m quite busy right now. How about June 15, 2020? I have absolutely nothing going on that day. I’m totally free. And don’t forget….BYOB. Oh, that’s right, he can make his own wine.
Humans didn’t come from monkeys. We share the same lineage.
Maybe God is a monkey????
JESUS IS OUR ONLY GOD N HE HAS THE POWER TO CURE ANYONE OR ANYTHING N HE DECIDES WHAT HAPPENS TO US FOR A REASON, THE KKK IS DEVILS WORK N NON-BELIEVER WILL SIMPLE DIE IN JUDGEMENT DAY N GO TO HELL, GOD IS MY FATHER N GOD IS OUR ONLY SAVER!!! EVERYONE NEEDS JESUS AT SOME POINT IN LIFE!!!
If Jesus has all this power to cure then why do Christians use medical science??
Hospitals have chapels for people to pray in when they’ve lost all hope. But usually they turn to the doctors before God. Isn’t it ironic?
There are hundreds of religions that do not see Jesus as their savior….even Judaism.
You know, this guy’s right. Some people ARE like this. It’s true, this world we live in has bullshit like this no doubt
Thank you, Morgan!
Some of these “Christians” need to get their act together. getting so angry and yelling just pushes people away. I have a relationship with God. Reading all of this makes me feel saddened. If you want to ttalk to me bout anything just let me know. If not (which im guessing your going to reply something like “no thanks Christian”) i just want you to know that there are some real loving kind hearted good christians out there. Those are the TRUE christians. And above that all there is a even indescribable God out there.
This article is really upsetting. I hate how Christians are persecuted for this! This IS NOT real Christianity. People who label themselves as “Christians” while at the same time are racists and anti-gay have no real love for God. The bible teaches that EVERYONE CAN go to heaven. And no real Christian would say “damn it. if you don’t become a Christian, you’re going to burn in hell”. The bible also teaches that God loves EVERYONE no matter what race, enthnicity, size, shape or sexuality.
Even I will give you an “Amen” on that.
Wow, I just spent WAAAAY too much time reading all these posts.
I’ve seen Jesus Camp. It made me cry. And those poor little children being taught to pray to a cardboard cutout of George W. Bush freaked me right the hell out.
Here is the thing all the CAPS LOCK ON Christians, Muslims, etc. don’t seem to be processing. You say people who don’t agree with you are not Really Real True Believers™ of your faith. I say, then why don’t you stand up to them? Where the hell are moderate Christians, for example, when someone murders a doctor in his own church? AFAICT, they’re standing around blaming the victim. Where are the moderate Muslims when people start flying planes into buildings? Are they maybe off somewhere shouting Death to America??
If you are not part of the solution, then you are part of the problem. And guess what? You are not part of the solution. You “moderate” religious people sit there all smug in your salvation and self-righteousness, and tut-tut at those Not Really Real Believers™ instead of getting off your asses and doing something about them. Your silence gives them legitimacy. You see, your insistence that religion must not be criticized extends to them, too. These organizations tell their kids that they are doing YOUR god’s work. Then these same kids see the “moderates” aren’t speaking out against them. And you’re all saying the same thing, how Super-Keen-Great your religion is, and how everyone else must be preached at until they convert. You need to get out there and say “hey, this is wrong.” And not just with CAPS LOCK ON on an atheist site. We already know they’re whack jobs. You need to tell them! And each other, FFS! Of course that would involve actually taking action instead of sitting on your collective asses wishing at your Magic God-Star, so I’m not holding my breath for it to happen.
KKK can s.m.d.
alright, to start of, i am a uniterian universalist and i have athiest friends, wiccan friends, buddist friends and christian friends. I HAVE NOTHING AGAINST ANYBODY. Uniterian Universalism means you can believe in anything you freakin want. personally, i don’t know yet, i’m only fourteen, but i do believe that the people belonging to this site have some point, but are also being unbelievably disrespectful. And if I, an open-minded fourteen year old, think that you’re being rude and unfair, than thats a problem. The fact is, religion is part of the world, and it always will be. If you feel like wiping out christianity or any other religion will make the world a better place, than you should probably start recruting nazis today.
I want to point out that you are making unfair generalizations.
You people are talking about EXTREMISTS. I have a christian friend who is best friends with more than one gay person, several athiests, and believes in sience. I have a christian cousin who has gay friends and reads books about other religions simply to know about other cultures around the world. What would you jerks say about them?
how dare you point fingers and make incorrect generalizations against religion!
You are hypocrytical and cruel and unintelligent and have no idea what the hell you are saying.
None of those pictures worry me or make me fear for this world.
you do.
Exactly. There’s not much generalization in the pics.
And you are a UU? Your spelling worries me….”UNITERIAN”?
Then you say….
Very interesting.
Do you know of any atheist groups that induct and indoctrinate children to physically hate and hurt others?
This article is about religion-sponsored racism and bigotry.
I can’t help but feel that you’ve completely missed the point here.
Also, where did anyone say they were planning to wipe out religion? Or did you just add that part in because you felt like arguing against it? Clearly you didn’t read what I wrote, b/c I asked the supposed moderates to stand up to the extremists, and tell them that their behavior is unacceptable.
Personally, I do think the world would be better off without religion. It’s divisive and it encourages blind trust without, and in the face of contradicting evidence. But am I heading out to stomp it out of existence? Um, no.
I think you need to relax and drop the whole drama queen thing you’ve got going on. You’ll be much happier that way. Given that you’re 14, I’m fairly sure you’ve got enough stress in your life that you don’t need to go inventing any more.
Moderates do stand up to extremists all the time. Of course, it depends what exactly you mean by standing up to them. It would seem to me that even declaring Person X is not Really a Christian is standing up to them. Or to translate that phrase differently, we might read it as, “this person doesn’t represent my values and my interpretation of my religion, we don’t accept this person as being part of our community, what they did was clearly wrong and disgusting and we don’t support it, and please get the hell out of our religion.”
However, there are countless examples of people from Pro-life organizations (who I would hardly call moderate) condemning abortion-doctor murderers. I’ve met plenty of Muslims who condemn terrorism. And do you seriously believe most moderate Christians are blaming the abortion doctor over the guy who murdered him? If so, then I doubt they were moderate Christians as their beliefs don’t match with what I would associate with the term moderate and it sounds like you’re really talking about fundamentalist/extremist Christians. In other words, what evidence do you have that moderates do not stand up or condemn extremists?
Besides, when was the last time you stood up to racist comments or unacceptable behavior of atheists?
Wow, you totally missed the point. Way to go. When was the last time you ever heard an atheist justifying racist comments with their atheism? Your analogy is nonsensical.
Apparently you also missed the hordes of people all over the internet (the Newsvine comments on the msnbc articles come to mind, if you want a specific example) basically saying he was asking for it by being an abortion doctor.
And no, just saying “so and so is not a real Christian” is not standing up to anyone. Because they’re just going to turn around and say the same thing about you. And justify with bible verses. There needs to be a concerted effort to de-normalize these fringe groups.
I am getting over swine flu right now so I might not be as cogent as I would like.
So where are all the atheists calling out PilgrimOmega’s racist Bruce Lee Villain comments in this thread, or all the atheists condemning Jonolan’s “hilarious” joke about genocide. Clearly the latter remarks were made with his atheism in mind. Most atheists might want to deny it, but the atheism component of Marxism clearly played a large in role in the policies of the various Communist regimes’ horrific policies. But really this is all beside the point. How about standing up against racially insensitive and offensive remarks by atheists whether they did it in the name of atheism or not when they make such remarks on an atheist website? I don’t know, wouldn’t that be the right thing to do?
You didn’t say hordes of people on the internet forums. You specifically mentioned moderate Christians. Were those hordes people moderate Christians?
If anyone accused me of not being a real Christian I would have to agree considering I’m Jewish. I agree there does need to be an effort to de-normalize the religious fringe groups. I would be the first to team up with atheists in doing so, but I won’t help someone who thinks it’s okay to consistently piss on my shoes so to speak. The problem is I don’t really find your desire for moderates to stand up to extremists to be sincere (partially because they already do so); it sounds more like just another excuse to criticize religion in general.
Did you just dismiss the people I mentioned who were replying to msnbc news posts out of hand and then point me at replies to blog posts? That’s different, how?
You’ll need to extrapolate on the Bruce Lee comment. I’m not sitting here listening to ten minutes of video rant just to explain the lack of reaction to you. But I hadn’t read either of those posts until you just linked me to them. So there’s where my lack of reaction comes in. As for the second person, s/he was hardly speaking for other atheists. S/he was giving his/her personal opinion. Tell me, are any of the above people just giving their personal opinion, or are they saying they represent Christianity? If a Klan guy says he hates everyone who isn’t just like him, it’s his personal opinion. But the Klan in general claims to be a Christian group.
As far as an “excuse” to criticize religion? I don’t need an excuse. I think it’s garbage. Flat out, negative influence on the world, divisive, bullshitting garbage. I’m just saying that if religious people want to do PR damage control, they need to rein in the whack jobs. I don’t honestly care if you team up with me or not. In fact, I don’t recall offering.
No, clearly you’re having trouble following a simple argument. The reason I dismissed your MSNBC comments is because I don’t believe they represent Moderate Christians, which is the group you originally referred to as not condemning abortion doctor murderers, which I find hard to believe. You haven’t provided any evidence to the contrary that these people do in fact represent moderate Christians.
Ah. If I only understood things in exactly the same way you understand them, then Things Would Be Just Fine. Clearly.
Well, I guess we’re at an impasse, then. I dismiss your blog posters because I don’t believe they are purporting to speak for anyone but themselves. Can you follow that?
Calm yourself, Linz. I too am UU (and around your age,) and I think this article is HELPFUL. It can be interpreted in different ways. Your interpretation seems to be that this is here solely to entice anger in Christians by generalizing them as bigoted, violent, closed-minded people. That’s not what it’s here for. It’s raising a point and showing us these problems that everyone, theist or atheist, should be aware of.
Relax a little bit. We are part of the “thinking man’s religion,” aren’t we? (Although as an atheist, I prefer the term “philosophy.”) If anything, this article is a good learning tool. If thought about thoroughly, it actually does a lot to illustrate the difference between religion and extremism. I mean, heck, I’d be elated if my history teacher brought this page up in class and allowed the class to debate it.
Also, our UU philosophy exists because of FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION. People on this board have as much right to believe what they want as you or I do. Don’t reprimand them for it. It makes for a much more intellectual conversation.
I said it a few months ago and I’ll say it again. Religious extremism is a parasite… don’t get bitten.
UU4IA!
-Mel
Feel free to respond. I’m not gonna bite your head off.
I find it funny that religious people seem so offended by the pictures you provided, and they even find time to argue against atheism on this website. Frankly, every picture provided is a replication of an actual event in history- not something fabicrated or based on belief. Yet Christians and other religious groups will constantly put down atheism and gays because of certain BELIEFS, not any facts. Just a thought.
In addition, I find that the philosophical and logical defense of atheism is ‘The Problem of Evil’ and many Christians cannot argue it without appealing to ‘We can’t begin to understand God’s plan’. HAH!
Here is the argument-
If god is an all-good, all-powerful, and all-knowing God, he would know about evil, have an inclination to stop evil, and have the power to stop it. So why doesn’t he? He must not be an all-good, all-powerful, and all knowing god!
Some Christians may argue that there is evil called soul-building evil in which those involved or observers might grow from it, and there’s also the issue of Free Will. To contradict both of these, I will simply ask if the evil committed during the Holocoast exceeded the minimum of ’soul building’ evil. I would say that the extermination of 9 MILLION people might (I’m rolling my eyes) have just surpassed that minimum, especially when genocide such as that in Darfur and Rwanda continue to this day. The Free Will issue is solved by also using the example of the Holocaust, but this time with Hitler. God could have intervened by preventing the sperm and egg in mother from reaching each other, or even allowed a different sperm or egg to meet in order to prevent the creation of Hitler. If he had done this, it can be assumed nine million people would not have been killed, and both the mother’s and the father’s free will would have been preserved.
Something else to keep in mind- who was the mastermind behind evil? No, not Satan, my dear friends. It was GOD! If he’s all good, all-knowing, and all-powerful, wouldn’t he have known before creating Lucifer that Lucifer would become the initiator of evil in the world? And done something about it?
Haha, you’re Christian arguments make no sense. Deal with it.