Atheists are Dangerous!

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keith99

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Or at least so says one Christian here who started such a thread in the Christians only
area.

Atheists Are Dangerous

Providing this link to an opinion piece on Fox.

Today's atheists are bullies -- and they are doing their best to intimidate the rest of us into silence

I am in fact dangerous, but far from ignorant. I know a lot of Christians here rarely if ever go into the Christians only area (save perhaps a denomination specific one for their denomination). This sort of thing seems to happen often so I have decided to start dragging some of these into areas where those accused can answer. Forcing them into the sunlight so to speak.

So this is a chance for atheists to disagree and a chance for a more balanced representation of Christianity to show us where you stand.
 

Paidiske

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Oh good grief.

People are dangerous. Some of those people are atheists, and some are not.

Maligning whole groups of people based on (assumed) evil motives or bad behaviour by some members of that group is both irrational and unethical.
 
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Heart2Soul

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Atheists do not scare me....they are just regular people with a difference of beliefs. I have spoken to the kindest of atheists and the meanest of Christians.
I think the person who thinks this has a very limited source of atheists to compare to.
As @Paidiske said people are dangerous.
 
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Tanj

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Or at least so says one Christian here who started such a thread in the Christians only
area.

Atheists Are Dangerous

Providing this link to an opinion piece on Fox.

Today's atheists are bullies -- and they are doing their best to intimidate the rest of us into silence

I am in fact dangerous, but far from ignorant. I know a lot of Christians here rarely if ever go into the Christians only area (save perhaps a denomination specific one for their denomination). This sort of thing seems to happen often so I have decided to start dragging some of these into areas where those accused can answer. Forcing them into the sunlight so to speak.

So this is a chance for atheists to disagree and a chance for a more balanced representation of Christianity to show us where you stand.

Disagree? I don't think so. Don't get me wrong, all of the reasoning presented above is bogus, but the conclusion is pretty solid.

Paraphrasing someone who's name I don't remember, Christians, Muslims, Hindus etc are like a sport league competition, all playing a game which follows a set of rules. Atheists want to tear up the rule book, dismantle the stadiums, and get the game banned.
 
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Paidiske

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Atheists want to...get the game banned.

Do most atheists want to ban religion, though? In my experience, most just want it to be voluntary rather than compulsory.
 
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stevil

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Or at least so says one Christian here who started such a thread in the Christians only
area.
Yeah, I saw that thread. Got annoyed by it. It certainly troubles me, the way some Christians think, in specific about how they think about people who don't belong to their specific exclusive group.

I wanted to create a thread in response here, in our area where even atheists can post. But low a behold, Keith has beaten me to it.

The opening to that Christian's only thread
"Atheists are dangerous. There is no other simple way to put it. They have one goal: To hate on our beliefs and confuse our minds while darkening our soul."

I would say that people in general have needs and wants.
Our needs are first and foremost on our minds:
  • Food/Water/Air
  • Warmth
  • Shelter
  • Health
This gets us into a state of surviving. All people need this Christians, Atheists, Muslims, and all the rest.
Beyond that, in order to be happy-ish we need:
Freedom
Family/Friends
Income
Work/life balance
This also applies to all people Christians, Atheists, Muslims, and all the rest.

Religious people then tend to have other wants/needs beyond that of Atheists:
Religious books
Place of worship
Religious rituals etc
Atheists don't have these specific wants or needs

Some religious folk have certain obligations:
Belief
rituals
Church/Mosque etc attendance
Atheists don't have those specific obligations

But that's about as far as it goes.
Most people come up with their goals, or purpose above these already stated necessities.
For some religious folk it might include being a servant of god, or to be Christ like, or simply to maintain belief, or to convert others...
For some atheists, they might be determined or enticed to try and convince religious folk that religion is unsupported by facts and instead is a conn. But this is the minority of Athiests those that could be considered anti-theist.

But most people (regardless of belief or non belief) have goals which might be to be a successful career person, or maybe to become famous, or maybe to give to others rather than to take, or maybe just to enjoy life, or maybe to bring u their children, or to get out of poverty, or to better themselves, or to become rich. People have many goals.

It certainly isn't true that Atheists mostly have a goal to hate on the beliefs of others.
In my experience Atheists don't belong to an exclusive group. We aren't really a group, we are just individuals, our lack of belief does not bind us together and we have no obligation to convert others to be like us.
I consider that our position lets us be more free to be tolerant of diversity and essentially to mind our own business.
For some Christians, those that are driven to evangelise, I see them more like the fictional Borg of Star trek, looking to assimilate all to be like them, and in doing so, destroying individualism and cultures and diversity. Assimilation is an act of destruction.

Its kinda like the ending of the Golden Compass series where the priest comes the the new world and takes it as his purpose to assimilate the Melufa, to change them, to take away their differences and make them more like him. Where as Mary (the atheist) lived amongst the Melufa, got to know them, became their friends, learned their language and experienced doing things their way. She was open minded and willing to learn rather than to assimilate, she left them to remain as them, to be them and instead she had wonderful memories of this different peoples. Not seeing their difference as a threat, but merely as a difference. This is an act of admiration and respect.
 
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stevil

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Paraphrasing someone who's name I don't remember, Christians, Muslims, Hindus etc are like a sport league competition, all playing a game which follows a set of rules. Atheists want to tear up the rule book, dismantle the stadiums, and get the game banned.
Not really no.
Atheists would more be considered as not fans of that game. From time to time they might catch a glimpse of the game, but not understand it, they might even think it seems weird. But most don't want to tear down the stadium and stop others from playing the game.

It's only when those in the game come knocking at our door telling us we must play the game, or getting into our government and forcing their rules on us that we might then see this game as dangerous and then get motivated to tear that game down.
 
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Tom 1

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Or at least so says one Christian here who started such a thread in the Christians only
area.

Atheists Are Dangerous

Providing this link to an opinion piece on Fox.

Today's atheists are bullies -- and they are doing their best to intimidate the rest of us into silence

I am in fact dangerous, but far from ignorant. I know a lot of Christians here rarely if ever go into the Christians only area (save perhaps a denomination specific one for their denomination). This sort of thing seems to happen often so I have decided to start dragging some of these into areas where those accused can answer. Forcing them into the sunlight so to speak.

So this is a chance for atheists to disagree and a chance for a more balanced representation of Christianity to show us where you stand.

An interesting contrast for you is between the example given by Jesus, and that given by the brand of Christianity that the Fox article promotes. Jesus, according to the gospels, walked calmly into danger and made no effort to defend himself, while pointing out that he could if he chose to. Facing this was so intensely difficult that Luke has him literally sweating blood, due maybe to burst capiliaries, under the intense pressure of making a conscious choice to be tortured to death, while wrestling with this in prayer. The kind of populist Christianity that inspired the other thread however has something more like a 'silence them before they silence us' philosophy, that occasionally actually does spill over into a 'kill them before they kill us' mentality.
 
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Tom 1

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Or at least so says one Christian here who started such a thread in the Christians only
area.

Atheists Are Dangerous

Providing this link to an opinion piece on Fox.

Today's atheists are bullies -- and they are doing their best to intimidate the rest of us into silence

I am in fact dangerous, but far from ignorant. I know a lot of Christians here rarely if ever go into the Christians only area (save perhaps a denomination specific one for their denomination). This sort of thing seems to happen often so I have decided to start dragging some of these into areas where those accused can answer. Forcing them into the sunlight so to speak.

So this is a chance for atheists to disagree and a chance for a more balanced representation of Christianity to show us where you stand.


Actually thinking about it, hypothetically if atheism were to be the sole remaining belief system of some future world govt, as some Christians seem to fear, and that govt were somehow able to strip society of any remaining religious texts and influences, it could be dangerous in the sense of leaving humanity rudderless in some fairly profound sense. Unlike lower animals, we are too complicated to be lead purely by evolutionary imperatives, the arguments for evolved morality as a complete or sufficient modus vivendi don't really apply outside of polite debate, books and 'labs'. Any current atheistic moral system or code has its roots as deeply in milenia of religious belief as firmly as any other. Arguments for a morality based in rational thought are a bit daft, as they completely (ironically) ignore how the human brain actually functions. Neitzche's ideas of the will to dominate and the myth of the new superman haven't played out very well on the world stage, although it might suit some people in their private lives - a secure society ultimately rooted in belief gives people the freedom to test things out and live how they like, even when that society is rooted in ideas that they reject. So, in that sense, atheism could be dangerous. Atheists however are just as wrapped up in the cotton wool of milenia of religious and moral teaching as anyone else.
 
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Gene2memE

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Atheism isn't a belief system.

It's a stance of non acceptance of the claims of others that some god or gods exist.

The article in the OP is drastically, laughably and dangerously wrong. It completely misconstrues what atheism is, what stances atheists actually take and practices such lovely fallacies as poisoning the well, guilt by association and arguing from personal incredulity. And that's just in the first several paragraphs.

The author imbues atheism and atheists with a range of characteristics that are seemingly of his own invention. The few hard stances and logical inferences that can be drawn from atheism, he either ignores or is ignorant of - it's hard to tell which, given the author's apparent lack of understanding of his subject matter.
 
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Atheism isn't a belief system.

It's a stance of non acceptance of the claims of others that some god or gods exist.


Maybe believers in God have "a stance of acceptance" "that some god or gods exist"

Or also maybe Atheists do have a belief system, believing that God does not exist while others do believe God exists.
 
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dickyh995

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Maybe believers in God have "a stance of acceptance" "that some god or gods exist"

Or also maybe Atheists do have a belief system, believing that God does not exist while others do believe God exists.

See this is one of the problems I always run into, the strawman erected around what an Atheist is. An Atheist has simply rejected the claim that god or god exist. So no, there are not atheists who believe a god exists...

Most atheists I know have a world view based on secular humanism, a perfectly legitimate and rational way to build a moral way of life.
 
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Greengardener

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Here's another opinion, for what it's worth, in response to your interesting post.

Perhaps there is some danger in everyone, in that our views are limited by our own brains and eyes. We may try various degrees of feeling with others and understanding, but what we synthesize, we speak from our own point of view, regardless of our background. It seems to be a fact of life that out of our hearts we speak. It always saddens me when people speak in sweeping generalizations, because the way it looks to me, it doesn't seem to speak truth. Lies don't make life work well. So when there are broad strokes painted against a group, is it because the speaker can't see the individuals?

And maybe the danger is that some people have no moral compass to stop them from invading the space others have a right to occupy, like a kind of cancer to society. How does one define right actions that make life work in societies apart from a philosophy of a higher power or perhaps from a study of history to see what has worked in the past? History will show us that as people slipped in morality, society became more unstable. Societies are strongest when people think in terms of what good for both self and those around. Granted, there are self-centered people on both sides of this aisle (theists and atheists) who are simply out for self at the expense of the rest of us. Those cloaking themselves with a label of Christian shouldn't surprise us terribly: the description of wolves wearing lambskin to deceive is a fit description and it works better (for the wolf anyways but not for the prey) than wolves not so cleverly cloaked.

In all fairness, most people don't realize that we are all in the same foxhole. This earth of people is spinning into, as far as human reasoning goes, an uncertain future with certain destruction at some point in time, hopefully many hundreds of years away as opposed to tomorrow. The scary part is that nature may delay that destruction but man can certainly speed it up with a variety of effective tools: wars, environmental contamination causing ill effects on human life, or even in the case of Abel, a rock in the hands of Cain. We don't get to live through this. And we are all in this together. With this as a logical view, why would any of us want to throw grenades at each other? Why in the world would we want this to be US against THEM in erroneous sweeping generalizations? The shrapnel will surely affect us all.

We often fog the scene with situations about "them," but does that honestly address any important questions that impact our lives? As one who feels strongly that we were given brains and feeling hearts for a reason, I'm not one to suggest anyone check theirs in at the door of life and take on the thoughts of another. Look around. Look inside. Be so frankly honest that it hurts, because it will. Isn't the real question something along the lines of what are you doing to do with your one chance at life? I wonder how much progress in understanding we could gain if we start there.
 
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stevil

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Or also maybe Atheists do have a belief system, believing that God does not exist while others do believe God exists.
Atheist means lacking a belief in god(s)

An atheist could be a person who lacks belief one way or the other.
But an atheist could also be a person who believes that god(s) don't exist.

Most atheists are those that lack a belief one way or the other.

I myself am ignostic, which means the very definition of "god" hasn't been formed well enough to evaluate, hence the question "do gods exist?" is jumping the gun. First sort out the definition, then we can work out if it is valid or not.
 
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Tom 1

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It's a stance of non acceptance of the claims of others that some god or gods exist

This one always makes me chuckle. There's a common theme here - some atheists at least appearing to have some sort of idea that by stating something in a certain way it gives it some kind of real existence. Sure, if you were an algorithm with a limited set of criteria and literally nothing else, you could take a 'stance of non acceptance'. But you aren't (as far as I know). Within certain contexts - like typing words on an internet forum - you can delude yourself that you exist on some ethereal plain where everything is clearly defined and you are a purely rational being, but in reality you live inside a self-created reality your conception of which has little to do with the handful of facts you might have at your disposal. A person is by definition a belief system.

To put it another way, you can fiddle about with the icing but its the cake than fills in most of the gaps. Put the cake in a completely different context, and you'll find yourself rearranging the icing without any real awareness. You can then call the icing a rational conclusion based on your observations, but it's nothing more your interpretation of what the cake is telling you, i.e. a functional belief system.
 
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bèlla

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I don’t feel threatened by atheists. But then again, I don’t behave threateningly towards them. I extend the same warmth and kindness I wish to to receive in return. I’ve never had bad experiences on account of my faith. And I’ve known a lot.

I spend less time preaching at people and more in walking out my faith. That does more to sway a heart than arguments or disrespect.
 
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It certainly isn't true that Atheists mostly have a goal to hate on the beliefs of others.
I agree, in my experience it's typically just the ones that troll Christian forums that enjoy hating on the beliefs of others.

The article in the OP is drastically, laughably and dangerously wrong. It completely misconstrues what atheism is, what stances atheists actually take and practices such lovely fallacies as poisoning the well, guilt by association and arguing from personal incredulity. And that's just in the first several paragraphs.

The author imbues atheism and atheists with a range of characteristics that are seemingly of his own invention. The few hard stances and logical inferences that can be drawn from atheism, he either ignores or is ignorant of - it's hard to tell which, given the author's apparent lack of understanding of his subject matter.
I chuckled at this post because this is what atheists do all the time to Christians on opinion pieces in the news. I agree that the article being referenced is garbage, but it just is sort of humorous to me that this happens all the time about Christianity. I could literally take the quoted section above by Gene2memE, and replace the word Atheism with Christianity and use it as a response to the typical type of stuff the media puts out.
 
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