Discussion ender

I recently saw a discussion in facebook that was sparked by a status update that said something along the lines of "Oprah's percersion of the christian religion is shameful.".

Percersion is not even a word, but anyways.

A lot of people left comments and it soon became a pretty fired up debate that included atheists, muslims and christians all defending their world views. Theists attacked each other and defended the holiness of their sacred texts and some atheists tried to refute their claims and other atheists tried to calm everyone down.

The debate ended pretty bad for us atheists. So i decided to jump in and try to fix it, this is what I said:

"ALL religions are stupid. There is nothing "shameful" about criticizing anything. None of the things that Ophra has said about religions is inherently offensive or false, as far as I know. If you are offended by the things she has said about Christianity... get over it. There is nothing special about your faith.

The bible is just as divisive, hateful, perverted, destructive, prejudicial, dangerous, bigoted, counterproductive, evil, unjust, detrimental to society, hurtful, damaging, abominable, bitter, pestiferous, vile and despicable as the Quran. The only difference is that the Quran is more explicit about it, while the bible is more poetic.

Both religions believe in eternal punishment for finite crimes and BOTH religions are founded on NO evidence. BOTH religions have killed "infidels" and other religions in the past. Christians wiped out MILLIONS because of verses written in the bible that explicitly command people to do so. You still have the nerve to name it "holy" bible??

You guys are extremely biased (Lauren, Nathan) you won’t admit that there are verses in the bible that are responsible for innumerable deaths, suffering and destruction. The Old Testament is riddled with depictions of YOUR god wiping out hundreds of thousands, sometimes just for the hell of it. Jesus was not here to unite people, he was not here to bring peace on earth, he was here to divide us and so far the myths of Jesus and Mohammed have been pretty good at that. Look at yourselves.

Jesus was JUST A MAN. If he even existed (which is unlikely and unsupported by independent evidence) he was not the man you think he was. Luke 19:27 “But those mine enemies, which would not that I reign over them, BRING HITHER AND SLAY THEM BEFORE ME” Luke 12:51 “Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but DIVISION”. Do not try to interpret this, these are very explicit verses and they mean what they say. Jesus, if he ever existed, was nothing but a man.

Muslims are known for killing those who disagree and beheading those who “disrespect” islam. I know not all Muslims are the same, I am aware that the difference between fundies and moderates is faith. Fundamentalists usually believe the whole thing as opposed to moderates who betray reason and faith equally. But I cannot paint the whole bunch with the same brush because it wouldn’t be fair to either side. HOWEVER, I can criticize moderate religion for refusing to stand up and criticize those who take their “holy” texts literally and kill people for them. Moderate Christians should stand up and criticize people like the Phelps family, George Bush, Pat Robertson, etc. You would be surprised to see how people will stop criticizing your god when you start criticizing the other Christians around you who give you a bad reputation.

The “no true Scotsman” fallacy will not fly here. It is very easy for you to preach about being responsible and accountable, but when other Christians do stupid shit around you all you do is close your eyes, plug your ears and say “lalala not listening! Not a true Christian lalala”. Get up your asses and clean up YOUR mess. The rest of us are tired of having to clean it up for you.

Look at what your faiths have done for societies. None of the “accomplishments” of faith are exclusive to faith; every single good thing that can be achieved through religion can and has been achieved through secular means as well. However, some of the bad things about faith ARE exclusive to faith.

Lauren: You need to read the bible with an open mind and THINK ABOUT IT. It makes absolutely no sense. As far as the hating goes, the bible is not really unique in its kind; most of the books written around the same time period were just as violent. The Iliad talked about genocide as well and there are many others. The only difference is that NOBODY is claiming that the Iliad is the source of our morals. Nobody is killing in the name of the Odyssey. But people are dying and killing because of the teachings of the prophet Mohammed and the hatred that the god in the bible has for apostates, homosexuals, etc. The similarities between the Old testament and the books written around the same period is evidence that this may very well be just another human made myth. Would you really be surprised?

God has failed to reveal himself to people like me, like Eric, and millions out there. According to the doctrines of BOTH Christianity and Islam I deserve to be punished forever for not believing in something. God has revealed himself to you but he has not revealed himself to me. What makes you so special? Why wont he just appear next to me right now? Free will? I have one word for you: SATAN. Satan without a doubt is absolutely certain that god exists but he still uses his free will not to worship him. The Israelites by the way had pretty concrete evidence that god existed: all the plagues, the parting of the red sea, a tower of fire leading them by day through the desert. And that apparently didn’t violate their free will. And by the way, when they got to the mountain Moses went up the mountain for a while, AND THEY DECIDED TO CREATE A NEW GOD WHILE HE WAS GONE. So obviously, god could reveal himself to us, yet he doesn’t. Its stupid, immoral and divisive. If Ophra really was criticizing this… I am glad she did and I hope more people do it"