Rid, his point was your over reaction to some views that oppose yours.

Most people who are to some degree alongside me do not overreact in such a way, we just try to bring other sides along.

And frankly the words racist/sexist and discriminate are highly mis-used so be carefull with them.

I'll admit, that I did overreact. I won't take back what I said, however, as prejudice is prejudice, and believe organized religion is wrong is prejudice towards organized religion, just as believing that being a different skin colour is wrong is racism.

That's your definition of racism?

Well that means I'm not racist YAY (something that happened somewhere else).

@Rid
Yes you did overreact and twice infact even after receiving a warning about it.
And to use your own words against you..

My views are not racism in any way its called being an Atheist.

And as I mentioned before in my last post I know a LOT about religions having being taught for many years (probably more years than you have actually lived on this planet) about all forms of religion not just the Catholic church, so I probably have a more formed opinion on this subject than you.
And after many years of study and reflection on religion I have come to the conclusion that ALL organized religion is wrong - thats my point of view and the point of view of many people on this planet.I do not wish to offend anyone or attack them for their own personal view or beliefs, if your happy with it you live with it.
Nearly every religion teaches tolerance of others and their viewpoints and especially tolerance of other religions something that you are obviously lacking!
I believe in Darwinism in all its forms, I find it VERY hard to believe that someone made the earth and all living things on it I also find it very hard to believe in any kind of miracle, science is the answer not religion!
How many wars have been started over the centuries about Science? Zero is the answer
How many wars have been started about Religion - Nearly every one one so far...

This is what I believe and unless I see direct evidence of the contrary - such as "Jesus" coming back to life or "God" saving all the millions of starving people on this planet and stopping all
 wars, I will carry on to belive what I believe.

Mark420

lol, I don't think all wars were fully on the premise of religion, but some certainly used it as an excuse.

If these religions teach tolerance of other religions and beliefs..... well just have them take a good look at some in particular, a very BIG conflict of interest there......

I don't think it's actually possible to tolerate them all lol.

There is a difference between Atheism and prejudice. Atheism, as you pointed out, "is commonly defined as the positive belief that deities do not exist, or as the deliberate rejection of theism." That has nothing to do with religion being wrong. Saying religion is "wrong" is prejudice. Not believing that God exists is Atheism. You pointed that one out yourself.

So, by your own admission of the definition of Atheism, I'm not lacking any tolerance at all, except towards prejudice.


Sorry for my vagueness with the definition of racism.

I think the original topic posted was way too vague and open-ended.
That said, I disagree that nearly every war has been started by religion. It is simply the most convenient excuse to cover human greed. It's not like the crusaders were all that interested in converting the Muslims. It was an excuse for the Pope to increase his prestige and power, and an excuse for the knights to plunder the spoils. And every other war has had greed or a megalomaniac at its helm, not least of which is Bush and his current mess in Iraq. At least he didn't use religion as his main cover this time, he used his WMD scare and "liberation of the oppressed people" tactic, and nobody today doesn't know that the main reason for going to war was the expansion of American military bases, and attempting to secure a cheap flow of oil. Is that greed or not, and what war at heart has been different? So i don't think it's fair to generalize religion as the cause of wars. It does get dragged in, however, by extremists, who use it to justify their means as well. Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, what have you, there will be those who are racist in their religion, and can't tolerate diversity, and those will fight in the name of their religion. But that's only those on the fringe, and isn't representative of the religion as a whole. Plus Darwinism, Atheism, and what have you aren't any better, because they reset the concept of right and wrong to be whatever the individual feels it is, and remove personal accountability from the equation. And that isn't any better than the wrong side of religion.

Hence why I don't even have a label, I'm just me.

But some religions at there core dictate to slay ones that don't believe it, would that not conflict with tolerance of other beliefs quite seriously...... That's assuming I haven't been mis-informed that is.

I suppose there must be some like that. But I can say with certainty that the Christian, Muslim, and Buddhist religions, at their core, do not condone attacking other people on the basis of religion, but instead promote tolerance of non like-minded people.

In the light of my main objection the answer to this questions should be obvious. It requires certain abilities to do the reading which you are suggesting. Some people are more suited to study than others. Some people cannot concentrate on the content found in many books of the Bible for more than a few minutes without falling a sleep. Some people might even come to the conclusion that reading the Bible is something only extremely idle people are even capable of doing. Many people have to work so hard they are always exhausted. For others their limited mastery of language renders much of the Bible meaningless. Should they their time spend much of their limited time reading Leviticus, Ezekiel and Revelations when they would require someone to tell them what it means anyway and even the explanations would be barely comprehensible. Let the fanatics like me and thee revel in the word to our hearts delight but make no judgements of others who have better uses for their time.


That is only one aspect of Christianity for Christianity embraces a great variety of people and a great variety of experiences. I really get tired of people who try to squash it flat into a linear measure so they can compare themselves with other people favorably.

This post has been edited by mitchellmckain: Mar 19 2007, 06:07 PM