Malfunction
Newbie
- Joined
- May 8, 2004
- Messages
- 1,314
- Reaction score
- 0
Right, so I'm currently reading The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins (which I encourage everyone to read, and I mean everyone), and I've been an atheist ever since eighth grade. I love this book. It re-confirms everything I think about religion, and even provides new methods of disproving theists that I would never have realized. My rant is this:
THEISTS ARE ****ING IGNORANT.
I had reason to believe that one of my closer friends was religious in some capacity, and we've been chatting on AIM for a while now arguing. I started slowly, and I hinted at him being religious. He then claimed to not be religious at all, to which I was shocked. Then, he said he was Christian. My initial response [that was not sent] was "WTF?" but I held back and had him explain it. Needless to say, the explanation was ridiculous and hardly made much sense.
Then I hesitantly asked (fearing that my assumptions would be correct) if he supporter creationism and intelligent design. As you might expect, he does. We then argued about this for a good amount of time, with him falling back to illogical and unreasonable ideas, clearly being cornered.
Now we're arguing about the credibility of the Bible, and how it's virtually no different than if a friend of yours in a nearby city called you up and exclaimed that his neighbor turned a bunch of water into Gatorade and then resurrected his grandmother from her grave. His argument is that "hundreds of people saw Jesus do it" to which I inquired "is there proof of this?" Obviously there isn't, and now he's trying to change the subject by suggesting that world history can't be proven either then because we're essentially doing the same thing, believing anecdote after anecdote (though I received no argument after bringing up the shitloads of physical evidence that can confirm much of history).
The point of this thread is simple:
Why is it more acceptable to be an illogical, unreasonable, sheep believing anything your mommy and daddy tell you than being an investigative, logical, reasoning, "charismatic stallion" (thanks Yahtzee) even today in 2008? What the **** is wrong with the world?
I suggested that my normally-open-minded grandma read The God Delusion, and before I could even finish my sentence she angrily cut me off and briskly walked out of my room. She's a Catholic/Christian, just like I used to be. What the **** is wrong with people? How can anyone justify blindly believing something without even attempting to question their faith? Why does the majority of the world support this ignorance and stupidity?
I give my friend credit. At least he was open to questioning his ridiculous beliefs, but still. He's a smart kid. I used to consider him one of my smartest friends, but now things have changed.
Why is it that it is always necessary to disprove someone's belief rather than they prove it? Is it perhaps because there is no ****ing proof behind their bullshit? Are they so naive as to not see these fallacies?
The bottom line is this: I'm completely pro-civil liberties and personal privacy. BUT -- where do we draw the line? Religion is a plague that infests the majority of our planet. It has been motivation for many to pursue violence and war; it has encouraged scientific ignorance through trying to spread the word of creationism; most of all, it is not free of doing harm unto others, whether that be psychologically, intellectually, or physically. Religion has decreased intelligence through its mere existence. How is this not a harmful practice?
I suppose I'm just fed up with all of the bullshit. We live in a society where some people would discuss the latest trials and tribulations of some slutty, stupid celebrity rather than debate nor even question their religious beliefs. This is unhealthy, and if you're too thick to see so, I probably don't even want to interact with you.
And I think the worst part of it all is that I truly believe that atheism is correct; that Richard Dawkins is right. This is the one subject that I'm more than happy to be completely biased and bull-headed on, because I sincerely believe that there is no falsehoods in how I feel about this. I've tried really hard to be unbiased, but there is just no way. There is no God. There are no gods. There is no Holy Land. In the [probable] words of the great Penn & Teller, "religion is BULLSHIT!"
Thank you.
*rant brought to you buy 3am fatigue, hunger, and angst
THEISTS ARE ****ING IGNORANT.
I had reason to believe that one of my closer friends was religious in some capacity, and we've been chatting on AIM for a while now arguing. I started slowly, and I hinted at him being religious. He then claimed to not be religious at all, to which I was shocked. Then, he said he was Christian. My initial response [that was not sent] was "WTF?" but I held back and had him explain it. Needless to say, the explanation was ridiculous and hardly made much sense.
Then I hesitantly asked (fearing that my assumptions would be correct) if he supporter creationism and intelligent design. As you might expect, he does. We then argued about this for a good amount of time, with him falling back to illogical and unreasonable ideas, clearly being cornered.
Now we're arguing about the credibility of the Bible, and how it's virtually no different than if a friend of yours in a nearby city called you up and exclaimed that his neighbor turned a bunch of water into Gatorade and then resurrected his grandmother from her grave. His argument is that "hundreds of people saw Jesus do it" to which I inquired "is there proof of this?" Obviously there isn't, and now he's trying to change the subject by suggesting that world history can't be proven either then because we're essentially doing the same thing, believing anecdote after anecdote (though I received no argument after bringing up the shitloads of physical evidence that can confirm much of history).
The point of this thread is simple:
Why is it more acceptable to be an illogical, unreasonable, sheep believing anything your mommy and daddy tell you than being an investigative, logical, reasoning, "charismatic stallion" (thanks Yahtzee) even today in 2008? What the **** is wrong with the world?
I suggested that my normally-open-minded grandma read The God Delusion, and before I could even finish my sentence she angrily cut me off and briskly walked out of my room. She's a Catholic/Christian, just like I used to be. What the **** is wrong with people? How can anyone justify blindly believing something without even attempting to question their faith? Why does the majority of the world support this ignorance and stupidity?
I give my friend credit. At least he was open to questioning his ridiculous beliefs, but still. He's a smart kid. I used to consider him one of my smartest friends, but now things have changed.
Why is it that it is always necessary to disprove someone's belief rather than they prove it? Is it perhaps because there is no ****ing proof behind their bullshit? Are they so naive as to not see these fallacies?
The bottom line is this: I'm completely pro-civil liberties and personal privacy. BUT -- where do we draw the line? Religion is a plague that infests the majority of our planet. It has been motivation for many to pursue violence and war; it has encouraged scientific ignorance through trying to spread the word of creationism; most of all, it is not free of doing harm unto others, whether that be psychologically, intellectually, or physically. Religion has decreased intelligence through its mere existence. How is this not a harmful practice?
I suppose I'm just fed up with all of the bullshit. We live in a society where some people would discuss the latest trials and tribulations of some slutty, stupid celebrity rather than debate nor even question their religious beliefs. This is unhealthy, and if you're too thick to see so, I probably don't even want to interact with you.
And I think the worst part of it all is that I truly believe that atheism is correct; that Richard Dawkins is right. This is the one subject that I'm more than happy to be completely biased and bull-headed on, because I sincerely believe that there is no falsehoods in how I feel about this. I've tried really hard to be unbiased, but there is just no way. There is no God. There are no gods. There is no Holy Land. In the [probable] words of the great Penn & Teller, "religion is BULLSHIT!"
Thank you.
*rant brought to you buy 3am fatigue, hunger, and angst
I'm glad I got it out of me though, and in retrospect, I actually think it relatively well-written.
