messenjaH responds to me:
quote:
Well missionaries want to give others food and by their beliefs they are instructed to tell others about Jesus.
That doesn't change the fact that they are exploiting people.
It simply means they are conscious of it.
Which only makes it worse.
quote:
I don't feel they are trying to exploit anyone
That doesn't mean they're not. When you put conditions on something, you risk exploitation. And when you proffer necessary services to a population that is desperate with that condition, then it is exploitation.
What is the primary purpose? Is it to give others food, clothing, and medicine? Or is it to spread the good news?
You never did get around to answering my direct question of you:
Tell me, which is the most altruistic act:
1) Providing support for an endeavor where every twelve-and-a-half minutes you interrupt the program to inform all the participants that you are the one supporting the endeavor.
2) Providing support for an endeavor where at the beginning and ending of the program, but not during the program, you inform all the participants that you are the one supporting the endeavor.
3) Providing support for an endeavor but never telling any of the participants that you are the one supporting the endeavor.
[side note: Is this avoidance of direct questions going to be a habit or is there some threshold of number of times I have to ask a question before you answer it?]
quote:
I mean they aren't forcing anyone to believe the things that they do.
Yes, they are.
The deal is this: You become good little Christians and we'll keep giving you the food, clothing, and shelter. First time's free, but like all drug dealers, they eventually ask for some sort of return on investment.
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By assuming that the people that missionaries target to help do not have their own free will to or are not intelligent enough to believe what anyone tells them then you are saying these people are gullible and dumb.
But that's precisely the way they are treated. They are too dumb to know about Jesus and must be "taught" about it. It never occurs to the missionaries that these people don't need Jesus.
For at least the fifth time:
Suppose you were at the gym doing laps in the pool and somebody keeps pelting you with life preservers, trying to "save" you.
Is that someone being kind or is that someone being a pain in the ass?
The attitude of the person on the side is that you are somehow too stupid to understand that you're in need of saving. They assume that being in the water is a bad thing and you're just too stupid to know that. The concept that you might think differently never occurs to them.
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Christians wouldn't hold food back from anyone
And yet, they do.
Again, do you not know the actions of Mother Teresa? She routinely exploited the poor and kept them poor. She refused to allow her missionaries to consolidate and reduce expenses. Why? Because her obsession about poverty overruled the concept of actually helping. More than one person suffering from AIDS has been told by Christian missionaries that they need to repent their sinful ways.
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I would be impressed if I saw a group of atheists travel around the world helping others who are in desperate need.
Doctors Without Borders
Oh, and you're forgetting about WHO (World Health Organization). There's a reason that smallpox has been eradicated and that there are only a few thousand cases of polio every year. It's because people came together to deal with a specific problem and focused on the problem rather than use it as a pretext for proselytising.
When was the last time a religious organization wiped a disease from the face of the earth?
Now, are DWB and WHO "atheist" organizations? I'd say no. But you're engaging in a fallacy that atheists are just like theists except without the god. Atheism is characterised by the absence of the trappings of theism such as the need to gather together and commiserate. When was the last time you got together with your friends to have a deep philosophical discussion about the non-existence of Santa Claus and how that affects social structure? It's a ridiculous concept. Why would anybody do that?
The reason why you don't see very many "atheist organizations" is because there is no reason for them. Instead, you see people who gather together to apply the actual "atheistic" concept of "without regard to religion."
And if you're going to gather for a purpose "without regard to religion," why would you exclude anybody based upon religion?
Oh, by the way, one of the most prestigious hospitals in the United States, Johns-Hopkins, was established specifically to get away from the religious-sponsored medical system of the time. It was to provide a place for people to receive medical treatment without regard to religion.
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Missionaries give medicine and food out and then they express their beliefs. And again noones forcing them to believe.
You do realize that the second sentence is completely contradicted by the first, yes?
You get the food and medicine with the expectation that you will come to believe. If you don't, they go away.
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See, there is a difference between what atheists are called to do and what christians are called to do.
True. Atheists find their own callings. Sometimes those callings are exploitative. Sometimes they're not. Christians are called to exploit people front and center.
The primary purpose of missionaries is not to provide food, medicine, and shelter. It's to convert the heathen. The rest is just the means to get your foot in the door.
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God says stand up for your beliefs, express them etc.
So? What does the fact that god says it have to do with the fact that it is exploitative, rude, and downright evil?
Stand up for your beliefs, by all means.
But if nobody asked you to express them, what makes you think you should? Because god told you to? The people you're expressing them to don't believe in your god and are quite happy with their own spirituality, thank you very much.
Is it so difficult for you to put yourself in their shoes? Are you so incapable of empathy?
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More importantly when missionaries risk their lives in countries just to help others to survive these people must notice their kindness.
False bravado.
They're not there to help others. They're there to convert the heathen. The rest is just the means to get your foot in the door. And if you die in the process, you become a martyr to the cause which only feeds the cancer.
They are doing it for the glory of man, which is strictly condemned by Jesus.
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Christians are supposed to be noticed by their actions not their words.
So why speak at all?
Tell me, which is the most altruistic act:
1) Providing support for an endeavor where every twelve-and-a-half minutes you interrupt the program to inform all the participants that you are the one supporting the endeavor.
2) Providing support for an endeavor where at the beginning and ending of the program, but not during the program, you inform all the participants that you are the one supporting the endeavor.
3) Providing support for an endeavor but never telling any of the participants that you are the one supporting the endeavor.
If Christians are supposed to be noticed by their actions, not their words, why are they proselytising at all?
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I would ask "why are you people here helping us?"
So why don't these Christians, who are supposed to be noticed by their actions rather than their words, simply reply, "Because nobody should have to go to bed hungry"? Why do they have to get into the Jesus thing?
What is the primary purpose? Is it to feed and clothe those in need or is it to spread the good news?
quote:
But I wanted to clarify this accusation of "exploiting".
All you've done is made it worse.
You recognize your actions and consciously carry them out.
Since those actions are exploitative, it means you are deliberately doing it.
That's worse.
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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!
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