Religious Nonsense

For those who do believe, I want to ask for a prayer for a friend.

I was told today that he's been having suicidal thoughts, and he borrowed one of my handguns two days ago. He gave good reasons for it, saying he was going hog hunting out in Thorndale and wanted a sidearm for backup. I trust this young man with my life.

I pray I can trust him with his own.

This sucks, nonsense or not.

 

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Yo, bigot: Your rubber-glue vendetta is as stale as it is worthless.

Yeah, that's right: Believers can only be what you say.

(¡guffaw!)

You're a little late on that one. (The point of forgetting Torcaso was to duck the rhetoric while posting indignant self-righteousness↗. Its moment has passed, but, hey, you had other priorities↗ in the moment. You know, rubber-glue vendetta, and all that.)

 

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Read the posts by the various theist and atheists. And personal ad hominems don't do you any justice either.

 

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It's not ad hom if it's true and relevant.

No, really. You could have made a difference, had something to say, and put two cents in on Torcaso right when someone who should know it was doing something else, but you chose rubber-glue vendetta. Your priorities are your own, and if they compel you to bigotry, that is your problem and you should not make it anyone else's.

"Libelous hatemonger" might be words that sting a bit, but if you don't like the description, it's easy enough to change your behavior.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Reason

 

Better late than never. The point is am I correct or not?
If I am correct (again) then why do you insist on trying to diminish the truth of what I am saying. And compounding your duplicity with trying to insult me (again).
I know I am disagreeable when it comes to religion. I have had experience with it.
OTOH you are disagreeable with me personally. Without knowing me, you are prejudiced one!

 

Show me where there is bigotry. Unlike you, I have only made my position clear in general terms to the general public. I don't engage in ad hominem unless attacked unfairly. But so far, unlike you, I have restrained myself from calling you an asshole.

And as to displaying bigotry, it is you who is insulting me based on the fact you believe in God and therefore I must be wrong. Prove me wrong.......!!!

Or do you feel so superior that you don't need to, being that I am a bigot in your eyes?

What you are offering is "insult on injury". Your are not even debating the issue.
Way to go "moderator"......Yuck.

 

Its original context, from another thread:

It is easy enough to argue on behalf of freedom from religion, but we also need to remember that the legal status of atheism as de facto religion—i.e., religious position or belief, a rhetorical circumstance for juristic purposes—does not simply guard atheists against religious persecution; it also protects others from bullshit in the name of atheism.

(#560↗)​

It's part of a larger question about freedom from religion; apparently I made the mistake of presuming "atheism" and "atheists" are not entirely disempowered↗.

(No, really, watching identity activists forget their movement's successes in order to overstate the intelligence and capabilities of their chosen enemies is a proper exercise in holywhatphuckery.)​

Now, maybe you're all well and fine with redefining words for the sake of atheists in order to make it easier to criticize religion without putting actual study and effort into it, but the way I see it that sort of behavior is the sort of stuff "theists do". And that's the thing: That someone I think is wrong does something doesn't mean I get to do it too; tit-for-tat in pursuit of rubber-glue satisfaction of vendetta is no decent or justification. I mean, sure, okay, whatever is important to you, but I have no use for that stupidity.

 

Actually this thread has made it clear that religions are dangerous and divisive.

Atheists must be shut down, else they will interfere with our sacred Wars and Fatwahs and all the goodness we spread around.

The point is Tiassa, a person can be a good, kind, and considerate person without being religious.
God is not neccessary in the practice of being good.

 

I agree, as I already have stipulated to the two way application in a prior post. maybe even twice or three times? I'm not gonna search for it. You seem to be very good at that.
What is your point?

 

Of course you do, you are prejudiced against atheists.

I have studied religion and I found it to be wanting in logic, science and RW practice, major league..!

Point out where my posts were stupid as compared to the theist and most obviously in religious arguments.
If you cannot present evidence of my stupidity, then that would exempt me from your prejudicial judgments, no?

So, please lay off, will you. (this is twice now).

 

Like I said:

(One of the values of STEM education is that it can disabuse one of the notion that people who are assholes must be wrong as well.)

Guys who talk like that seldom accept the contra applied to them: that someone might disrespect them for demonstrating that they deserve disrespect.

And that's an aspect of the kinds of religious nonsense most common here: the nonsensical religious have - in their view - earned respect by being religious.

 

And it does among their peers. Religions are unified blocks of fervently dedicated people.

If someone were to tell me; "I am a Deist but I reject all religions as representing truth",
I will respect that person.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deism

I prefer the related terms "absolute principle of the uiverse" and "universal potential".
It's a scientifically defensible position, whereas "intervention by miracles" is not.

p.s. I believe that the term "Providence" in this context means "probabilistic eventual determinism"

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/375480/

 

Huh?
Believers can only be what they say.
Idiot! (that's for the "bigot")

 

Interjection.

I Googled that and immediately thought it is unfair for reference. Not all of us live in US history, and I don't believe, Write4U, is a US citizen.

I'll ask a question: "When was abortion made legal?"

I'll give an answer: "In the United Kingdom, the Abortion Act of 1967 clarified and prescribed abortions as legal up to 24 weeks. Other countries soon followed, including Canada (1969), the United States (1973 in most states, pursuant to Roe v. Wade, the federal Supreme Court decision which legalized abortion nationwide)".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_law#History

I'm not an American citizen. I have no idea what "Torcaso" means (I first thought it was the name of a movie).

Please say, or show me where you said, what you meant by "Torcaso". Otherwise, just don't mention it.

 

Since when did atheism get legal status as a religion? Which country? It certainly doesn't have that status where I am. It's not even listed as an option on the census, or on any other public choice of religious persuasion, as far as I know. "No religion" is the closest you can get.

 

Some missed stuff:

What is an "abrahamic", in those questions? (unfamiliar noun, and when you make up words nobody can get the meaning from context).

But Musika's question passes muster, with you.
You aren't going to like where Musika has taken you, if you ever do look around. Dawkins is pretty much right about those guys.

 

Point of order: Part of the reason you think it's unfair is that you're not paying attention to what's going on.

Alright, y'ready?

(1) Post to Jeeves↗

(2) Jeeves responds to Tiassa↗

(3) Tiassa responds to Jeeves↗

(4) Iceaura responds to Tiassa↗

― Responding to (3) above, Iceaura quotes (1) above.​

(5) Tiassa rebuffs Iceaura↗ as nonsensical.

(6) Jeeves answers Tiassa's response to Iceaura↗.

(7) Tiassa responds to Jeeves↗​

And there you go. In (1) I answer Jeeves in a discussion about the ways in which we can apply religious freedom. In (4) Iceaura tries to make a point. Dusting Iceaura in (5), my point is made in (7), responding to Jeeves' declaration of his own talent:

But as long as we're on the subject of talent, or whatever, consider, please, at some point I do concede that nothing I have to say will help any atheist who doesn't see the need to put some effort and learning into their critique. And maybe that sounds arrogant, but I shouldn't actually have to say the word Torcaso. Maybe if he hadn't stepped outside the context of what he retorted to, he wouldn't have gaffed up so embarrassingly badly. But, hey, by the time we get that all straightened out, whatever we were talking about before has been successfully evaded, so maybe it's not so embarrassing.​

Call that more fool me, as I figured pointing Jeeves back to the issue in its context was a better pathway than asking if I was supposed to believe he's Iceaura. And like I said, Write4U had an opportunity back then to address the point but chose not to; as noted, he had a different priority, which was a two-bit, rubber-glue vendetta retort. This is observable: (8) Write4U interjects in response to Tiassa↗.

You might find it unfair to expect someone to have a clue what they're getting into, but it only comes up because W4U wants in↑ on another discussion, when I told Iceaura, an American who generally knows his history, that I should not have to remind him of Torcaso.

We should make the point that W4U wanting that discussion is just another distraction: Note that despite having been present for the bit about Torcaso, he's trying to have the wrong discussion, as such.

See also the post earlier in this thread in which I respond to both Write4U and Iceaura in separate sections. In #435↑ above, it's pretty clear who I'm talking to when I say, "This coming from an atheist who didn't know Torcaso?"

And now look at what you've done↗ by deliberately deciding to take part in the troll job. Go ahead and think it unfair; would you prefer I spit disgust, or maybe just laugh?

And what does that have to do with anything? Oh, right, you're postulating a different context in order to support your complaint. Here's the difference: Iceaura is an American who generally knows his history, but apparently didn't, thus mocking the evolution of how his society came to protect atheism as religious freedom. If I noted Roe on viability, and Iceaura disdained and mocked the point for the sake of trolling, I would similarly posit that I ought not need remind him of Roe.

That was the point: He chose that path and got called out. Here we are, ten days, another thread, and how many posts later, and, I'm sorry, just what do you think is unfair to whom?

• • •​

Just out of curiosity, did it occur to you, at any point in that, to actually look up what we are talking about?

Here's a 2015 summary↗ from one of our neighbors:

• "Finally, no, Torcaso v. Watkins never ruled that atheism is a religion. Far from it. What it found and reaffirmed was that a Government requirement or demand that one believes in God is unconstitutional. The reason for that is simple. You should read your First Amendment to understand why."​

Ask yourself how it works. How do you protect atheism according to freedom of religion? After all, atheism isn't a religion. You protect it by counting it among religions as a religious stance or outlook: One has the right to have no religion, declare no religion, or refuse to declare any or no religion. Torcaso is the beginning of a juristic transition arising from dissent in a school bus case (Everson) that arrives, seven years later, in Epperson, at the explicit declaration of freedom from religion:

Following Everson, although the Supreme Court has approved some state support for parochial schools, it has refused to tolerate any governmental preference for religious views over non-religious views. In Torcaso v. Watkins (1961) the court unanimously struck down a Maryland law requiring notaries public to affirm a belief in God. Justice Black again wrote the decision, stating, "We renew our conviction that we have staked the very existence of our country on the faith that complete separation between the state and religion is best for the state and best for religion."

Justice Black left no ambiguity: "We repeat and again reaffirm that neither a State nor the Federal Government can constitutionally force a person 'to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion.' Neither can constitutionally pass laws or impose requirements which aid all religions as against non-believers, and neither can aid those religions based on a belief in the existence of God as against those religions founded on different beliefs."

One year later, in Engel v. Vitale (1962), the Court voted 6 to 1 to invalidate a New York law mandating a "non-denominational" prayer at the beginning of the school day. Again, Justice Black wrote the opinion: "It is an unfortunate fact of history that when some of the very groups which had most strenuously opposed the established Church of England found themselves sufficiently in control of colonial governments in this country to write their own prayers into law, they passed laws making their own religion the official religion of their respective colonies. Indeed, as late as the time of the Revolutionary War, there were established churches in at least eight of the thirteen former colonies and established religions in at least four of the other five. But the successful Revolution against English political domination was shortly followed by intense opposition to the practice of establishing religion by law .... By the time of the adoption of the Constitution, our history shows that there was a widespread awareness among many Americans of the dangers of a union of Church and State .... The history of governmentally established religion, both in England and in this country, showed that whenever government had allied itself with one particular form of religion, the inevitable result had been that it had incurred the hatred, disrespect and even contempt of those who held contrary beliefs."

In 1968 a unanimous Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional an Arkansas law prohibiting the teaching of evolution in public schools. Epperson v. State of Arkansas (1968) makes absolutely clear that the First Amendment guarantees "freedom from religion" as well as "freedom of religion." Emphasizing that "The antecedents of today's decision . . . are fundamental to freedom," Justice Arthur Goldberg explained, "Government in our democracy, state and national, must be neutral in matters of religious theory, doctrine, and practice. It may not be hostile to any religion or to the advocacy of no religion; and it may not aid, foster, or promote one religion or religious theory against another or even against the militant opposite. The First Amendment mandates governmental neutrality between religion and religion, and between religion and nonreligion."

(Andrews↱)​

____________________

Notes:

Andrews, John. "Lieberman's support for government-backed religion: an attack on the letter and spirit of the Constitution". World Socialist Web Site. 28 September 2000. WSWS.org. 22 August 2018. http://bit.ly/2NcrmAB

 

That is obfuscation.

I would like a thesis statement and maybe a paragraph.

:EDIT:

You didn't have to even answer to my post; have it more as a suggestion.

 

Yes, thanks, and when I've needed to I actually have. You?

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Fair enough - but does not actual legal status as a religion within the US afford more than just the right to be considered among the options within "freedom of religion"?