The Trouble with Militant Atheist

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Basically anyone that disagrees with the religious people, even politely, is a militant atheist as far as they're concerned. I have even seen some of the local yokels here call people a "militant Atheist" for expressing support for scientific views when they are actually Christian or another religion. Its just a generalized term they like to use that implies "see? they're just as bad as us!" Its pathetic, really

Well, I don't know. I don't really see any problem to believe in scientific principles and to be spiritual/religious. Isn't the point of the religious books to take their message and act accordingly, not to take things literally? Isn't the metaphorical meaning the more important, and not to spend your time and effort on ridiculing the theory of evolution or what not?

What I'm saying is, I don't see a problem for someone to be both religious and scientific.

I am no more a dogmatist than a person who applies some self-defense training to an assailant armed with a knife is a violent sociopath.

I don't think that most atheists really dig in their heels unless they are confronted with religious people who pursue their religion with a complete disinterest in stopping to evaluate it or anything along the way. If I'm confronted with someone who is intent on not only clinging to but brashly promulgating a belief no matter what anybody says or what evidence comes forward, I feel justified in voicing my contempt for that person's entire character.

But the contempt is not because that person has a belief I consider to be silly; really, that's a bit of a side-issue. What is really at issue when an atheist is confronted with a holy roller is the fact that a holy roller's interest in promulgating his or her religion is based entirely on the need to validate his or her dependency. Disagreeing with a person's beliefs can almost always be done civilly without anyone involved feeling a need to convert the other, but I am not going to hold my tongue and pretend to be polite when the person I'm talking to might as well be openly masturbating in public. There are ways that people can handle their beliefs or ideas that are every bit as indecent, from my point of view.

Last edited by WilliamWDelaney on 02 Dec 2011, 8:17 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Me neither. I mean as discussed in this thread, the idea of the Big Bang originated with a priest. Later confirmed by scientists who may or may not have their own religious beliefs. One can have the belief that God created the Big Bang if they want. I just have a problem with people who want non-science taught as science in classrooms. Religion is for church.

I agree 100% with this.

Re: The Trouble with Militant Atheist

Re: Jesus Is At It Again With Fish Miracles!! !

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postp4209543.html#4209543





Hi techstepgenr8tion,

On the subject of "making arses of themselves", you appear to make assumptions that have bases in the realm of limited, and strongly biased, preconceptions that seem as fundamental to your dealings with other individuals as to anyone's other.

"Fish", and not just limited to the "Ichthys", in the Christianities, are a pivotal, multi-faceted, element of meaning, more frequently including, "Jesus Christ, God's Son, Savior".

It is most unfortunate that any of not yours interpretation of Parables will produce "arses" and "atheists" of others not in compliance of your interpretation. This certainly overwhelms any confusion between elements of "critisism" versus "critical anaylysis".

Far from any "dogma" of Parables, "dead fish on the beach" poses far more of a seemingly logical fallacy to a major World Religion categorization than it does to any "atheist arse" without subscription.

To keep it short, I will note the "unbearable" odour of Father Zossima's body, weighted with Ivan's parable of "The Grand Inquisitor" in "The Brother's Karamazov".

Having any Faith is much more than any shallow Capitalist Madison Avenue Marketing of "WWJD" without any concerns of "dead fish on the beach" of wordly matters of ultimates, reserved for "those other peoples" as "Left Behind" in the "wrong" church or realm.

Tadzio

Sounds damning, though I couldn't figure out how or by what means. Don't know what I'm purported to believe here either.

The comics were cute but as much puff and little accuracy as a pro-christian comic. So a militant christian waves guns, a militant muslim blows himself up, a militant agnostic sticks his head in the sand, and all a militant atheist does is type? The second paints religion as if its the source of these problems and wouldn't be common if religion weren't around. Its just incredibly naive stuff, that's all. If atheists are more right don't bother blowing smoke, leave that for people who'd need it. Integrity will outshine, always.


You might need to take a second try at phrasing that, I couldn't follow any of it.

As far as making atheists, no. When atheists get into dogma, and more so propaganda (ie. weak-sauce arguments that are easily blown away but get repeated the way the faithful repeat the bible), it just looks like more BS. I firmly don't believe that adults need that, in fact I do believe that atheists will come much farther from being the supreme adults of the conversation and not dropping to that level - likewise understanding that there are secular mechanics and social science discoveries wrapped up in the build, structure, and ritual of organized religion that they could and will want to take advantage of in their own ways.


You're English was breaking up here again. I don't understand what you're talking about, getting at, or interpreting as my take or my beliefs.

The only thing I can draw from this paragraph is that you're taking a shot at Evangelical Christians or more particularly Madison Avenue secularized Evangelicals. I don't follow much after that however.

Forgetting the abstract shots at a faith that I don't even hold; my point was that atheists don't do themselves a service by walking the low road, they don't do themselves a service by carpet-bombing the faithful with reducto ad absurdium arguments or enough glaring logical fallacies for the faithful to just fall down and give up at untangling them under the sheer burden of quantity.

Threads like this though probably will just draw the atheists who don't fully get the world around them, the ones in particular who are a bit naive about the human condition, and consequently they'll be bringing very primitive black-and-white views to the table, other people have brought it up as well that their easily at times as primitive in the abrasiveness of their assertions as common Evangelicals often enough. I guess it does take all kinds to make the world go round but simultaneously it does make these threads a bit hard to read.

What do you think the word dogma means? And how do you think it applies to "militant atheists"? (Feel free to also explain it in regards to [right-wing socialists] and [peace loving soldiers] if you want)
















So, as you can see, that image with the sun flowers implicitly says this: You put me in a difficult position, '8tion as it is very difficult for me right now to decide whether you are being intentionally dishonest in your argumentation or whether you are such a fool that are unable to understand both images you thought was smart and edgy to criticize by failing to communicate through the posting a image of some fish. Thank god Tadzio was there to force you to spill the bunch of BS you intended to say with the images.


Me not being an atheist, your example is not so great. However, this is the part in which you are either being dishonest or a fool or both. To claim I do not have intelligence over the religious is an implicit claim that I am very stupid and I won't take that insult lightly. And you did the same against n3rdgir1. The worst aspect of it is that you are incurring into insults and then call me and the other guy who posted that comic stupid and religious but you so blissfully expect no one to call you out on the fact that you are not addressing the arguments made by our images at all.

I think that my image is pretty clear, and since it clearly has made some sort of effect on you, I will post it again:


Clearly, my image is a rant. Every once in a while we get people who stupidly claim that there are militant atheists. Why? Because these "militant atheists" incur into extreme measures such as ... a) bashing religion in the internet. b) Claiming religion is wrong in books. I do not think anyone with half a brain would argue that these claims are stupid as they equate a guy being annoying and rude with... actual religious militancy. It is quite unfair and a great example of the stupid prejudice and bias against atheists. When we use the word 'militant' in front of a christian, we are dealing with an extremely violent person, maybe not a gun freak, but bear in mind that I didn't have a better picture. However, due to how abortion clinic harassers bombers exist, you cannot come and tell me that militant Christians are not a piece of violent s**t that makes the world terrible. Then we have the militant catholics and protestants and all the bliss and happiness they caused in Ireland. And of course, the easiest target in town, freaking militant, suicidal Muslims.

Thus the point is , that it is ridiculous, lame and stupid to put the "militant" tag on atheists that just make you angry for saying the truth, that there is no empirical evidence supporting your views of how the world works. And that there is actually evidence that helps us believe that your views are insane. That we know historically that your views brought no real benefit to the world but tons of social issues and catastrophe.

If with this point I am making, you think I am making an arse of myself and that I am as stupid as a religious person then you are a fool. If your intention was to derail attention from my argument through an ad hominem then you are dishonest.

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Then we have the strip posted by n3rdgir1. I am going to post it here again too.



The strip is quite unrealistic because we have a religious guy admitting the plague that religion has been in our lives. But it makes this point: Guys like the OP complaining about how 'angry' the atheists sound for stating their own opinions. And how those evil atheists should just shut up. Probably you would like atheists to shut up and not remind people of things that are as of now historical facts. The problem is that they will keep reminding us all about them. And that's just sad, you can't shut atheists up. Your only defense is to tag them as militant atheists or to reply with pictures of dead fish and claim that they are making arses of themselves and are just as stupid as religious people ... And as you can see, that defense does not work that well.


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It is telling anyway. For you people an atheist that voices his opinion that your god does not exist is worthy of th same title you give to a Muslim that recruits people to suicide bomb a Bus.

You are so wrong! When I first posted this thread I was not referring to a militant atheist as a person that disagrees with religious people.
I was referring to an atheist internet bully! A person that violently insults religion and religious people. Someone that is angry at the thought of a god that they don't believe in.
An atheist person that writes cruel,hateful words about people with any kind of faith.
I don't care if you politely disagree with me. that is fine but don't insult me or act like an elitist bastard
I have read many things on the internet by what I consider militant atheists. The worst was "All Christians should be killed" .
A militant atheist is insulting not politely disagreeing.
No, I don't think that most atheist are this way.
often times when people question science many atheist accuse them of being ignorant and stupid.
I thought atheism was all about asking questions. It is very arrogant to think you are more intelligent because you don't believe in a god.

Last edited by artrat on 03 Dec 2011, 4:16 am, edited 1 time in total.

Must be the later, I can guarantee you I'm not vogue enough for deliberate dishonesty.


Ah...so you think that my posting a fish was me hoping to make misinterpretations fly and then nail people on them. Hmm...I gotta stick around here more often it seems, just so I know what shenanegans I'm deliberately starting to make sure I know its deliberate. I suppose I'm just very green with the oneupsmanship games, I'll have work on that.

The real reason I posted dead fish - I *thought* it would get my point across in a more up front way, adjectives are mud around here and its almost painful to spit them out anymore.


That's really interesting. I claimed both cartoons were lightweight, that they were built on some amount of fallacy (cherrypicking would probably be the best way to concretely put it). I was really making that claim about the comics themselves.

To the last part - do you want me to spell out the inaccuracies? I can, just let me know if that's what you're driving at.


I get the rant part, I suppose though how much humor I find in stuff like that varies from time to time. I guess if we were going to be accurate, the picture would either have all militant or all 'militant'. 'Militant' in the sense of the Dawkins'esque blogger is like the Christian who complains about god being taken out of schools, like the muslim who constantly complains about how insensitive the west is their needs with adherance to the Sharia, or the agnostic who constantly complains that they are the only ones with intellectually honest ground and that both sides are killing them. As for militant: sure, abortion clinic bombers and compound people, plain, subway, and carbombers, I can't think of one for agnosticism although I'm sure someone could, for atheism I think cw10's was close with Stalin but, Mao got him AFAIK by another 50%. I guess if I want to critique your photo its mixing apples and oranges.


I'll ignore all the 'your' in that. Funny that I'm getting taken for a theist; I guess around here that's the way its suppose to be - ie. if you don't believe in a deity then there's absolutely no reason to defend the other side. I would agree that conformity and ritual/routine are some of the strongest factors keeping mainstream religion alive. The only additional problem though; a better way to live, by many people's standards, still hasn't been divised. I think part of the reason kids leave the church and then come back in their 30's as young newlyweds or parents is that they realize that outside of organized religion or culture there is no 'system' to help them raise a child the right way, to instill the values that they believe will bring success; in a sense it seems like its really more about organizational/social technology and the lack of that as well as networking (at least on that intimate a level) outside of religious organizations. I think that's what the increasingly secular world needs to figure out how to replicate and revive on a secular level. For that to happen though it would mean that the battle of dogmas would need to stop and the people who would argue that anything associated with organized religion is inherently bad likely need to be told that their attitude and outlook aren't helping the cause.


I would suggest that these kinds of jokes miss actuality by a good ways and end up really in a way attacking the image of atheists - I'm not sure where that puts me. I guess I'll make it easy here and opt for both.


Were they making fun of a religious guy or an agnostic? I would have taken that as a diss on the hippy next-of-kin.

I think atheists on a whole would be more effective if there was a smaller vocal minority leading the 'angry atheist' stereotype. That's all. It just paints a target on people and it means also that a lot of atheists who don't operate like that have a very difficult time admitting to theistic family members or friends that they're atheists because the friends and family have run into so many bad examples. Its a bit like the effect of a few people dragging themselves through life, failing out of school, constantly smelling like bonfires, and while ten times as many people smoke weed occasionally or even daily but aren't anything like that you end up with the stereotype of pot smokers. That's what frustrates me.


I don't know how many people really take that one seriously but I suppose I could see someone like Dawkins getting nervous if half a percent of the Christians out there would beat him up on sight - that's still millions of people. Then again I wouldn't be surprised if they already aren't used to being referenced as six-fingered, six-toed Hills Have Eyes folk by many of those who are grinding the European and American economies against the rail.

That's just it though. For someone to be a socially raging Christian, a socially raging Muslim, a socially raging Atheist, it almost seems to necessitate a lack of connection to surroundings or an understanding of how history is still welling up through the present as well as which parts of it are active, which parts of it are more or less dissipated, etc.

That's me, actually. (: I would believe that the Bible is immutable truth even if it were to say that the sky was green. Yes, I know: faith is blind, irrational, and frankly stupid, but I choose to have it anyway.



I don't know what kind of religious people u've met, and as a Christian I have to make the disclaimer that proselytizing is just part of the whole "going to heaven" deal. That said, if a religious person appears to be evangelizing for the wrong reasons (e.g. the need to feel morally superior or something), I'd say that's not a very healthy Christian doctrine.

Besides, I think Jesus taught about being peacemakers, helping people, love thy neighbour and so on, not "thou shalt win every religious argument".



Graphic much. O.o

I lost the thread a while ago...how did fish get involved?

Why are you so perverse?

ruveyn

From δοκέω, "dogmatic" refers to a school of medical thought that believed doctors should become knowledgeable in the greater body of medical opinion, especially that which was related to the Hippocratic writings, and use these ideas and reasoning based on these ideas in the treatment of illness. One of the flaws in their doctrine is that this led to preconceived notions about illness that may have impeded their ability to detect a problem that otherwise would have been obvious.

A rival school of thought, called the "Empiric" or "Empirical" school of thought, observed the belief that the causes of diseases could not be detected or understood, and it was therefore fruitless to attempt to contemplate them. The central concept behind the Empiric school was to value first-hand knowledge and experience over ideas that were generated during repose. One of the flaws of the Empiric school was their failure to ask questions and generate ideas during repose, therefore a member of the Empiric school went into his or her field mentally unequipped.

Furthermore, the Empiricists can be blamed for helping suppress human dissection. If Christianity hadn't come in later to introduce it's own gamut of inane ideas, thinkers of our time would be fighting against the equally hindering and stupid baggage of an antiquated pagan system, which overvalued the sanctity of a human corpse. For reference to how extreme and stupid they were in this respect (to obsessing stupidly over a corpse), refer to Antigone, by Sophocles. I registered myself as an organ donor specifically out of protest against this sort of nonsense. A corpse doesn't have thoughts in its head, damn it.

But then a religious person replies, "then where do your thoughts go after you die?" This sort of question is central to religion, and it's just as stupid now as it always has been. Your thoughts and feelings are abstract. You can no more abolish consciousness by killing a person than you can abolish redness by eating an apple or destroy tennis by stopping a tennis game. Therefore, it is vapid to treat an abstract thing like a person's "soul" as if it needs to "go somewhere" or "be somewhere" when its body has been destroyed. Like a universal, it exists post re and only post re.

Well, the problem is that it's hard to sound nice when you are telling people you don't know very well, in a public venue, that their ideas are utter rubbish.

I know that I am speaking to a friend when I am able to tell that person amiably, in the true spirit of neighborliness, that he is spouting utter horsefeathers and nonsense. I know that I would make a special call to that person, if he left town on a business trip, to let him know that he had left his bedroom light on, and I know that he would tell me the code on his alarm system so that I could enter his home and correct this matter for him and check for anything else amiss. I am sure that I wouldn't have to ask his permission thereafter to reenter periodically to make sure that his cat was alright, knowing how much his cat means to him. I would also know that I could expect the same in return, in the same spirit.

The offensive thing about certain people, religious or otherwise, is that they cannot tolerate hearing their ideas subjected to the slightest criticism. To me, the ultimate form of hostility and defensiveness is to react to such criticism as if it had done one personal injury. I can never be a friend to such a person, and I would be extremely hesitant to knock on his door to ask him for a half-cup of flour if I were in a pinch during the holidays.

Rational, logical actions must adhere to a strict logical system: axioms -- (rule of inference) --> formula --> theorem, meta-theorem. Irrational agents have no such restrictions.

I.e. because I feel like it.

Would you agree with the relation, "Art : Science :: Faith : Certitude," where "certitude" implies the type of rational, logical restrictions to which you refer? If so, I think this illustrates one of my criticisms of some truly rabid skeptics.

Complaining that "religion is an irrational belief," when the person who observes it does not declare it to be a rational or scientifically validated belief, is like saying that a painting done according to the ideals of the Expressionist school isn't photographically accurate to what the artist was painting. To many religious people, the images of angels and a fairy-landish afterlife represent not what they consider to be concrete fact but their reaction to life in general or "the vast immensity of the universe." I'm speaking of this very roughly, of course.

It's not that I don't understand it. The point on which I differ is simply that, speaking within-metaphor, I find what some people consider to be "high art" to be "tacky, lifeless rubbish fit only for dirt-scraping philistines," but that doesn't make me superior. It just makes me a pompous, smug, elitist bastard, at least if I were to voice such opinions unnecessarily. I see my own approach to the same outcome as more polished.

A religious person who is truly naive might actually think that atheists either lack any sense of connection to the universe or are simply too blind to appreciate it. Religious people who are more enlightened realize that atheists simply have a different outlook on it.

Last edited by WilliamWDelaney on 04 Dec 2011, 11:30 am, edited 4 times in total.

I haven't even read most of this. For me, this right here is the answer. I am an atheist and most of my family is quite the opposite. I don't walk around asking them, "how can you possibly feel like there is this magical being watching out for you, but he lets you get cancer?"
I don't even talk about my atheism with 99% of people because they are so judgemental.

A perfect example for you: I was on a plane a few months ago, sitting behind two very loud, very religious strangers. The entire (three-hour) flight, they talked nonstop about religion. They talked about how "a man is the spiritual leader of his household" and how someplace was so immoral the man actually said he "would not let [my] wife go there by herself". We're not talking getting robbed at knifepoint, we're talking rap music playing from nice clean stores. I had to sit there and listen to them go on and on about all this and I didn't say anything. I put on my headphones and tried to breathe away the migraine they were giving me.
I would be willing to bet all the money I haven't got that if the situation was reversed and I was being even half that loud about how I don't think God exists etc etc, they would have turned around and told me I was going to hell. In fact, I barely feel comfortable typing THAT, much less any of the other things that go with my being an atheist. But, if you came back with a parable or something directly from the bible, that would be okay for you to say.