Remember when "atheist" had a negative connotation?

I have gay relatives wtfunny, don't lump me in with gay bashing.

Bible and slavery wrote:

I have gay relatives wtfunny, don't lump me in with gay bashing.

Ahh, the ultimate refuge .. the now classic "I have black friends" excuse.

Most people have gay relatives .. which also means most folks who bash gay people also have gay relatives.

Honestly ... you can't cling to a book which orders the stoning of gay people, call it the ultimate moral code (or whatever,) then claim you're somehow NOT to be lumped in with gay bashing.

thejeff wrote:

You've kind of side-stepped the question. Also, it doesn't matter whether Buddha claimed to be God or not, people still worship him. Jesus didn't claim to be divine in the synoptic Gospels, yet people worship him too.

Yes He did claim to be divine in Mat-Luk. We discussed this several pages ago with our Muslim buddy...

And I did not side step the question. I don't exactly know, but if he took the time to appear to me, I imagine he would identify himself :-)[/quote]

Actually, you are incorrect about the synoptic Gospels. Only John puts those words into Jesus's mouth. This from conservapedia:

Looking at the context of all four gospels, Jesus again consistently shows that he is does not believe himself to be God. For example, Luke 22:42 Christ prays in the Garden for, not his will to be done, but the Father's. Mark 15:34, he cries out "My God, my God, what have you forsaken me?" Matthew 28:18, Jesus tells his disciples that authority had been given him in heaven and on earth. If Jesus knew he was God, none of these would make sense.

As for God identifying himself: how would you know that it wasn't Satan tricking you? By what standards and methodology would you be able to tell the difference?

Stagger Lee wrote:

As for God identifying himself: how would you know that it wasn't Satan tricking you? By what standards and methodology would you be able to tell the difference?

You'd just KNOW dammit!

thejeff wrote:

Do you believe there are multiple gods? I only believe there is one.

Polytheism in the Bible

There has been a lot of interesting discussions, but getting back to the original question…I still think that ‘atheist’ has a negative connotation in American society. However, I do think atheism will continue to gain acceptance. These are some of the reasons I believe people are changing their perception of atheism

1) Science (reality conflicts with many religious teachings)

2) Religious Fanaticism (9/11, witch trials, etc.)

3) Religious Quacks (doomsday prophets, cults, etc.)

4) Internet (ease of finding/confirming information)

5) Secularization of the church (I can see this helping and hurting)

It would be interesting to find out what other people think. Even the bible states '...Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?' Luke 18:8

I am sure that some religious people would just state that it is ‘Man’s desire to sin’.

The crazy rationalizations and circular reasoning of the believers in this thread (and you know who you are) have only confirmed what I suggested a couple of dozen pages ago: That there is no empirical proof for the existence of god; that, as far as "god" goes, the only question is belief or non-belief. We see here once again that only the witless, the willfully deluded, or the fanatical ever accept the challenge of actually arguing for the real, material existence of god (i.e. as opposed to things like the social utility of faith, or whatever you choose to call it).

By means of reason, you can only derive an argument for the existence of the deists' god (which is why most intelligent, fearless believers have gone no further than mute and absent "first cause" god). The god of the deist is a CONCEPT, not a material thing; it arises from our inability to frame a concept of infinity when our everyday rationality is derived from observations of the finite (having evolved as a feature of our unique sociability as a species, which is in turn derived from our vulnerability at birth and our relatively long natural lives).

To repeat: God is a concept, not a material thing. It may be a socially useful concept, and it may be a very human thing to have (all human beings have a sense of wonder and vulnerability in the face of great forces, great beauty, even the concept of time, from which the concept of god understandably arises-- even Karl Marx understood and sympathized with the impulse to faith when he called religion "opium of the masses; the heart in a heartless world"). But, we risk sounding like frightened children when we take seriously, and twist the evidence of the social and natural sciences in defense of, the idea of an actual, materially present, and loving god-- a god who supposedly defines and encourages proper moral conduct. Just as children grow and mature, so should whole societies, indeed, whole civilizations. Our survival and prosperity as a species probably depends on it.

Atheism has a decreasingly negative connotation even in so fearfully religious a place as 21st Century USA because it is beginning to dawn on just about everyone, everywhere that it (atheism) is now an imperative. History will record that today's fundamentalisms represent the frantic last stand of true religious belief.

A la cartesian, you sound like a ReconstructionistJew.

wtfunny wrote:

Bible and slavery wrote:

I have gay relatives wtfunny, don't lump me in with gay bashing.

Ahh, the ultimate refuge .. the now classic "I have black friends" excuse.

Most people have gay relatives .. which also means most folks who bash gay people also have gay relatives.

Honestly ... you can't cling to a book which orders the stoning of gay people, call it the ultimate moral code (or whatever,) then claim you're somehow NOT to be lumped in with gay bashing.

I have not bashed gays and don't put words in my mouth. You resorted to generalizations .

Great post. Just to piggyback:

-I see 2 as the most damaging. Fanatics and Fundamentalists have painted themselves into a corner and gotten paint on lotsa folks' shoes in the process.

-I will combine 3 & 4 as being next. The combination of publicity-seeking nutjobs (ie Westboro Baptist Church) and the publicity-granting internet could turn just about anyone away from organized religion.

Which brings us back to:

The problem of course is the notion that YOU having zero doubts should be considered sufficient evidence. To suggest that it should be is to claim personal infallibility - not the infallibility of God, the infallibility of YOU.

a la cartesian wrote:

Atheism has a decreasingly negative connotation even in so fearfully religious a place as 21st Century USA because it is beginning to dawn on just about everyone, everywhere that it (atheism) is now an imperative. History will record that today's fundamentalisms represent the frantic last stand of true religious belief.

I enjoyed your post. I agree with you on every point except this last paragraph. Religion has been on the ropes before, most notably in the pre-World War II period, only to really come back in the 1950s. Obviously, the current decline in religion was facilitated by rampant mistrust of social institutions starting in the 1960s. Since religion is inherently irrational, I think it is completely possible for certain religious groups to use chicanery and various marketing ploys to put bodies back in the pews. God has been declared dead before, but I think that is a premature statement.

To be perfectly honest, I don't think we are ready for a post-religious society. I know a lot of atheists, and most of them are completely mired in nihilism. One cannot tear down a social institution and then fail to erect an edifice in its place.

Not to get too political, but since many atheists (anecdotally speaking) don't come to atheism through rationality but rather from a dislike or distrust of religion, they don't have a solid mechanism in place to give them a "soft landing." In other words, since they, and by extension society, haven't erected a replacement scaffolding for religion, most fall into the trap of worshiping something else. Generally, they trade the God of religion for the God of the state; they trade the blanket security a deity provides, and then turn to the state to provide for them: all anxieties quelled, all necessities provided for.

To me, turning to the state is just trading one irrationality for another since, like religion, it also relies upon compulsory coercion. If anyone supposes this isn't true, try morally objecting to taxation sometime and see how loving the state can be.

I digress. As to the nihilism bit, the problem arises because secularists have ceded moral and ethical instruction to religion. Until secular society regularly educates the young in ethics (studying Aristotle, Plato, even Aquinas, as well as contemporary thinkers) the nihilism will continue. Also, again, if we tear down the religious scaffolding there will be a massive power vacuum that will be filled mostly by state power. I really don't want to see Paris c.1789.

Stagger Lee wrote:

a la cartesian wrote:

Atheism has a decreasingly negative connotation even in so fearfully religious a place as 21st Century USA because it is beginning to dawn on just about everyone, everywhere that it (atheism) is now an imperative. History will record that today's fundamentalisms represent the frantic last stand of true religious belief.

...

To me, turning to the state is just trading one irrationality for another since, like religion, it also relies upon compulsory coercion. If anyone supposes this isn't true, try morally objecting to taxation sometime and see how loving the state can be...

This ^ paragraph makes no sense.

Stagger Lee wrote:

To me, turning to the state is just trading one irrationality for another since, like religion, it also relies upon compulsory coercion. If anyone supposes this isn't true, try morally objecting to taxation sometime and see how loving the state can be.

You can renounce your citizenship just as you can renounce your religion.

Not Jeff But wrote:

Stagger Lee wrote:

...

To me, turning to the state is just trading one irrationality for another since, like religion, it also relies upon compulsory coercion. If anyone supposes this isn't true, try morally objecting to taxation sometime and see how loving the state can be...

This ^ paragraph makes no sense.

Care to explain?

Jeff Wigand wrote:

Stagger Lee wrote:

To me, turning to the state is just trading one irrationality for another since, like religion, it also relies upon compulsory coercion. If anyone supposes this isn't true, try morally objecting to taxation sometime and see how loving the state can be.

You can renounce your citizenship just as you can renounce your religion.

...and go where exactly?

Jeff Wigand wrote:

Stagger Lee wrote:

To me, turning to the state is just trading one irrationality for another since, like religion, it also relies upon compulsory coercion. If anyone supposes this isn't true, try morally objecting to taxation sometime and see how loving the state can be.

You can renounce your citizenship just as you can renounce your religion.

You still need somewhere else to go.

Atheists tend to be extremely left wing, anti-capitalist, and embrace Marxism. I am in agreement with Stagger's statement.

Stagger Lee wrote:

Not Jeff But wrote:

This ^ paragraph makes no sense.

Care to explain?

1) Religion does not have compulsory coercion

2) The state is real and necessary "in order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity...". Religion? Not so much.

3) Nobody thinks that the state loves them

4) The fact that one cannot easily avoid paying taxes is relevant to nothing at all

5) Well, you get the gist. It was a senseless and gratuitous paragraph.