hooah writes:
Atheists just as well think the mindset of creationists and militant religious zealots are wrong. The difference is, we don't press our beliefs on people who think differently. We encourage people to think differently. We try to enlighten you and give you our opinion on why we think your worldview stinks. But for the most part, sites like this, and discussions like this, are started by the religious in an effort to push a certain way onto others. Atheists, for the most part, are just fine and dandy with you getting dressed up Sunday morning for church. I know I don't care. Just don't tell me I'm blatantly wrong for my worldviews.
Well stated. It reminds me of the two related studies done by Bob Altemeyer where he divided a sample of people into three groups. In one group of people he presented a scenario where Christanity would be remade mandatory in public schools. In the second group the scenario was you live in a Muslim country and Islamic education and prayer is going to be made mandatory in your child's school. The third group was presented with the scenario that from kindergarten on, students would be told that there is no god and any such beliefs would be mocked as superstitious.
Well, as you might predict, atheists and most religious people found all three scenarios distasteful and a violation of basic freedoms. Fundamentalist Christians, on the other hand, overwhelmingly found #1 to be fair while rejecting #2 & 3. That itself is no surprise. When questioned for details about the fairness of #1 given that children of other/no faiths are there, the common answer was that this is a Christian nation and if they do not like it they can go to private school or leave the country.
But in scenario #2 they said it was wrong to force Islam on a child of another faith because the rights of minorities must be respected in a democracy. What would surprise the fundamentalist, I believe, is that atheists did not support mocking of faith in public schools because they believed it violated the rights of the parents.
The second study done by Altemeyer presented people with the situation of a Christian teen having a crisis of faith and approaching an Atheist family for advice. He also reversed that situation to another group. Again, atheists and most Christians said they would refer the teen in both situations to another person, their parents, a friend, etc. i.e. they did not think it their place to discuss these issues with someone else's child. Fundamentalist Christians 100% said they would do everything in their power to convert the atheist teen, even taking them covertly to church. And, obviously, 100% agreed it was a violation for an atheist parent to deconvert someone else's kid.
Sorry for the long Authoritarian rant, I recently made a two-part video series on these studies on youtube (
http://www.youtube.com/user/Lithodidman). And using that shameless self-promotion to seque to the OP....
I completely agree with most of you here, one the problems on YT (and the net in general) are trolls, whether they purport to be atheists, Christian, etc.A number of them are just omni-nasty, putting foul comments on anything they see. One particularly obnoxious troll is a 'Christian' (his description, certainly not by any definition I am aware of) that has now at least six accounts that are solely for the purpose of complimenting his own videos from his main channel and giving the illusion of support when he insults or bullies videos. Sad thing is the man is 40, not 17.
Doctor Bashir: "Of all the stories you told me, which were true and which weren't?"
Elim Garak: "My dear Doctor, they're all true"
Doctor Bashir: "Even the lies?"
Elim Garak: "Especially the lies"
™ Version 4.2
