String the terrorists up! Nice job...

[AshtonBlack]

I am qualified to say what an atheist is because I own a dictionary and can read. "A person that denies or disbelieves in the existence of God or gods." (Shorter OED.)

If both of your definitions can apply (and since 'disbelieve' is defined as both 'not to believe' and 'to believe the opposite', they do by my dictionary) then that is all the more reason to allow Stalin's and Mao's claims to stand. I have no issue with them being atheists. There is no atheist church for them to be thrown out of and no atheist dogma for them to follow - the sole criteria is that they meet the dictionary definition.

btw. the same dictionary defines a christian as someone "believing in, professing, or belonging to the religion of Christ." By that definition, anyone professing christianity, is a christian, no?

I reject the authority of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (ultimately, all arguments boil down to authority). Anything that refers to itself as "shorter" lacks credibility. The Longer Oxford Newen Glish Dictionary (LONG Dic) says that "atheist" is "undefined, as its adherents can't agree on its meaning." "Christian" means "a follower of Jesus, who did not preach violence against anyone, and specifically does not include Michigan militia members." That's what it says.

If merely professing something makes it so, then I profess that I am William Henry Gates III.

You reject reality, more like. Does that make you an a-atheist? You reject the the claims of atheists who reject the claims of theists?
Look, a Christian is someone who follows Christ, this we agree on. But the interpretation of the dogma allows different flavours of membership. (How many official sects are there?) I can see how having people like this would embarrass those who interpret the dogma in a more peaceful way, but it still does not alter the fact, that these people call themselves Christian and pre-port to follow their interpretation of dogma.

Being an atheist, there's no dogma to follow. No books to interpret and it says nothing at all about the person, other than he/she rejects the claims of people who profess a particular knowledge for the existence of a god(s).

Atheist is to theism, like baldness is to hair colour, or not collecting stamps is to hobbies.

[Ian]

Atheism is a word that shouldn't exist. There is no "ism" to speak of, no underlying philosophy.

That's where the prefix "a" comes into effect.

Right. But it's a bit of a pain to always have to explain that to theists.

[HappyHax0r]

Not much in the why of guns from what I've seen. Relatively speaking, of course.

Well, if they needed some extra 5.56 I'd be glad to give it to them. One at a time, at 3000+ feet per second, of course.

"When you need relief fast" .

[HappyHax0r]

Not really. You can hint at homegrown terrorists (like the American Taliban aka Christian Fundies) but if you were to actually come right out and say it on a popular news station, both the American Taliban and the politically correct Fluffies would freak.

You don't watch much television, do you?

I watch plenty. I have never seen any news station have an employee even say the words "American Taliban" or even hint that we have homegrown terrorists.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I'm not including Fux News in that. I'd rather eat shit then watch them. I'm sure then enjoy hinting that Obama is a marxist muslim terrorist.

The christian right in American might be crazy, but to compare them to the Taliban is just stupid.

Yeah, they're not nearly as organized or well trained, and no one's ever given them stinger missiles.

[HappyHax0r]

Valden mentioned that the US news never refers to homegrown terrorists as the "American taliban" in the post that RB took exception to. To the best of my understanding, she was not referring to the entire religious right either. Her point, and mine, was that there are groups that are every bit as fanatical and violent as the taliban in the USA.

I challenge the assessment that these nutties were "Christian." There is a tendency to mix religion with nationalism, and you end up with some very unsavory stews. "Christian" is just a label that is appropriated by various groups for political or other purposes. Since Jesus (unlike Mohammad) never took up arms or taught his disciples to kill people, it's really a stretch to label these people as his followers.

If they call themselves christian, that is enough for me. Or do you have some special god-powers to distinguish 'real' christians from the other kind?

One thing's for sure. They're not true scotsmen ;D.

[HappyHax0r]

Not much in the why of guns from what I've seen. Relatively speaking, of course.

I thought the why of guns was covered in the second amendment.

I believe it was so citizens could protect themselves against the government.

Of cause when the government has 10,000 tanks and a shit load of ballistic missiles, a couple of pistols and a shotgun ain't gonna help you much.

You cannot overthrow a government with legally held arms.

That may be true, but you might be able to use those legally held arms to overthrow a group of people who have access to bigger and better arms, thus furthering your ability to overthrow more of those groups, and eventually your government.

[Trolldor]

"Law of Escalation" I call it. Everything gets bigger over time.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Americans claim to be "Christian" because they're supposed to say that. ~90% of Americans have never read the Babble or can name all ten commandments. It's just something they're say, like saying "I'm a Republican" or "I'm a Democrat". They have no real idea what that means and it doesn't usually affect their daily lives. However, the extreme elements have always used the Book of Bedouin Tales to justify their personal insanity.

[Coito ergo sum]

Not really. You can hint at homegrown terrorists (like the American Taliban aka Christian Fundies) but if you were to actually come right out and say it on a popular news station, both the American Taliban and the politically correct Fluffies would freak.

You don't watch much television, do you?

I watch plenty. I have never seen any news station have an employee even say the words "American Taliban" or even hint that we have homegrown terrorists.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I'm not including Fux News in that. I'd rather eat shit then watch them. I'm sure then enjoy hinting that Obama is a marxist muslim terrorist.

Just a three second google search...

MSNBC report: http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cache:26 ... clnk&gl=us
CNN Newsroom: http://newsroom.blogs.cnn.com/2010/03/1 ... errorists/
CBSNews: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/ ... 9460.shtml
Christian Science Monitor: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0626/p01s01-ussc.html
MSNBC: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20278590/
Boston Globe: http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/edito ... terrorism/
FoxNews: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,399842,00.html
ABC News/Eyewitness News: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7VDt2uNp4Y
Fox News/Hannity: "disturbing information about the spread of homegrown terrorists" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JT5xXVO ... re=related
Fox News/Megan Kelley: homegrown terrorism:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14VZy6nP ... re=related
CBSNews report on homegrown terrorism: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydqFdpRJ_Q0
History Channel - documentary on homegrown terrorism over the last 100 years: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOhUfdL0ifM
Fox News: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7CvLvwFjMc

Reports on domestic terrorism threats, in my experience, are on the cable news shows - all three major cable news networks - quite often.

[Bruce Burleson]

Look, a Christian is someone who follows Christ, this we agree on. But the interpretation of the dogma allows different flavours of membership. (How many official sects are there?) I can see how having people like this would embarrass those who interpret the dogma in a more peaceful way, but it still does not alter the fact, that these people call themselves Christian and pre-port to follow their interpretation of dogma.

Being an atheist, there's no dogma to follow. No books to interpret and it says nothing at all about the person, other than he/she rejects the claims of people who profess a particular knowledge for the existence of a god(s).

Atheist is to theism, like baldness is to hair colour, or not collecting stamps is to hobbies.

But the interpretation the status of not believing in God can have some consequences. You don't want laws based on any religious belief. You don't want religion interfering with anything in the public sphere, including education and government. The interpretation of what atheism entails separates non-believers into strong or weak atheists. The strong atheist is, IMO, more likely to be more radical in his approach. Harris vs. Shermer is perhaps an example. Shermer refers to himself as agnostic and is a teddy bear compared to Harris or Hitchens when it comes to militance. The spectrum can go from "I don't know if there's a god or not - let's look into that issue," to "there is no god - let's burn churches." You would say that "atheism" as a concept has nothing to do with burning churches, so in describing someone who did that you would probably want to call them criminals, but would object to the atheist label as being irrelevant. Likewise, I see the militia group as terrorist, and object to the "Christian" appellation, regardless of what they call themselves. This, of course, calls the whole idea of labels into question.

[Valden]

If someone claims to be a Christian, I'll believe them.

You shouldn't. You should demand evidence. Belief without sufficient evidence is faith, remember?

What should I ask for, a Bible?

[Bruce Burleson]

If someone claims to be a Christian, I'll believe them.

You shouldn't. You should demand evidence. Belief without sufficient evidence is faith, remember?

What should I ask for, a Bible?

Only certain parts. For a fee, I'll show you which.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Look, a Christian is someone who follows Christ, this we agree on. But the interpretation of the dogma allows different flavours of membership. (How many official sects are there?) I can see how having people like this would embarrass those who interpret the dogma in a more peaceful way, but it still does not alter the fact, that these people call themselves Christian and pre-port to follow their interpretation of dogma.

Being an atheist, there's no dogma to follow. No books to interpret and it says nothing at all about the person, other than he/she rejects the claims of people who profess a particular knowledge for the existence of a god(s).

Atheist is to theism, like baldness is to hair colour, or not collecting stamps is to hobbies.

But the interpretation the status of not believing in God can have some consequences. You don't want laws based on any religious belief. You don't want religion interfering with anything in the public sphere, including education and government. The interpretation of what atheism entails separates non-believers into strong or weak atheists. The strong atheist is, IMO, more likely to be more radical in his approach. Harris vs. Shermer is perhaps an example. Shermer refers to himself as agnostic and is a teddy bear compared to Harris or Hitchens when it comes to militance. The spectrum can go from "I don't know if there's a god or not - let's look into that issue," to "there is no god - let's burn churches." You would say that "atheism" as a concept has nothing to do with burning churches, so in describing someone who did that you would probably want to call them criminals, but would object to the atheist label as being irrelevant. Likewise, I see the militia group as terrorist, and object to the "Christian" appellation, regardless of what they call themselves. This, of course, calls the whole idea of labels into question.

The whole idea of labels should be questioned. Especially when someone invests such importance in them as you obviously do.

I agree with your definition of the spectrum - that pretty much sums up the range of atheist thought and agrees with my earlier definition. Where we differ is that you seem to be projecting your wish to distance yourself from those that commit terrorist acts in the namer of christianity (and your need to distinguish them from 'real' christians) onto atheists - assuming that we would have similar reservations. This is not true in most cases (although I am sure you could find a few that would disagree with me.)

I have no objection to a church-burner being labelled an "atheist church-burner", if they are an atheist. I don't hold the label 'atheist' in any way sacred. It contains no baggage for me. It does not say that I am a follower of Dawkins and Hitchens. It does not say anything about my place on your spectrum. It is a convenient shorthand which describes the fact that I follow no religion and worship no gods - nothing more. Atheists, like christians, are just people and are heir to the full range of human strengths and weaknesses. There are decent people and scumbags in both camps.

[Bruce Burleson]

I have no objection to a church-burner being labelled an "atheist church-burner", if they are an atheist. I don't hold the label 'atheist' in any way sacred. It contains no baggage for me. It does not say that I am a follower of Dawkins and Hitchens. It does not say anything about my place on your spectrum. It is a convenient shorthand which describes the fact that I follow no religion and worship no gods - nothing more. Atheists, like christians, are just people and are heir to the full range of human strengths and weaknesses. There are decent people and scumbags in both camps.

It's not a big issue and I've probably made too much of it, as you have noted. "Atheist church-burner" puts two entirely different concepts together and makes it appear that they are associated, when they are not. It would surprise me if that did not excite some degree of negative response by non-believers. But, it's only a label, so it's probably not worth it to invest too much time and effort contesting it.

[AshtonBlack]

Look, a Christian is someone who follows Christ, this we agree on. But the interpretation of the dogma allows different flavours of membership. (How many official sects are there?) I can see how having people like this would embarrass those who interpret the dogma in a more peaceful way, but it still does not alter the fact, that these people call themselves Christian and pre-port to follow their interpretation of dogma.

Being an atheist, there's no dogma to follow. No books to interpret and it says nothing at all about the person, other than he/she rejects the claims of people who profess a particular knowledge for the existence of a god(s).

Atheist is to theism, like baldness is to hair colour, or not collecting stamps is to hobbies.

But the interpretation the status of not believing in God can have some consequences. You don't want laws based on any religious belief. You don't want religion interfering with anything in the public sphere, including education and government. The interpretation of what atheism entails separates non-believers into strong or weak atheists. The strong atheist is, IMO, more likely to be more radical in his approach. Harris vs. Shermer is perhaps an example. Shermer refers to himself as agnostic and is a teddy bear compared to Harris or Hitchens when it comes to militance. The spectrum can go from "I don't know if there's a god or not - let's look into that issue," to "there is no god - let's burn churches." You would say that "atheism" as a concept has nothing to do with burning churches, so in describing someone who did that you would probably want to call them criminals, but would object to the atheist label as being irrelevant. Likewise, I see the militia group as terrorist, and object to the "Christian" appellation, regardless of what they call themselves. This, of course, calls the whole idea of labels into question.

Nope. Sorry, adding prefixes and the like strong, millitant, fundamental etc, is adding extra meaning to "atheist". I'll say this slowly this time being an atheist says nothing at all about the person, other than he/she rejects the claims of people who profess a particular knowledge for the existence of a god(s).

All else is either self imposed or media imposed "extras."
Anyone who wants to shut religion down are more commonly known as an "anti-theist" as Hitch described himself. But they can STILL be an atheist, agnostic blah blah...


I mean.... militant atheist??? What the fuck..... "I reject your claims and I have a gun."