Not a very happy religion...

[Endless Summer]

Now knowing me this is most likely going to sound like a big complaining rant about everything and all......it's not...

When I go to places like Facebook and occasionally browse the pictures from some of the humour pages, I always stop to read the comments when someone posts a picture that puts down either atheism or theism.....and it strikes me as bizarre how people can become so 'passionately' angry for trying to convince other people that their way of thinking is superior to everyone else's. Every single time, a huge and usually worded with many a colourful expletive argument breaks out with each side declaring that their belief (or lack of it, as the case may be) is as I said....superior.
It actually makes me slightly depressed to see these comments....I have been personally called perhaps every single four letter word under the sun, purely for the fact I am atheist.
I suppose what makes me slightly bemused...is that both sects of belief have examples of people that in no way at all represent the mentality of the other people who share his/her views; I am talking about the people who blindly write in BLOCK CAPITOLS and hurl abusive language at any person who puts in the effort to give a decent argument in a calm and controlled way. And then in an effort to make a good come back, as is the norm for people to do in those situations, is to base all of their facts about the people of the opposing view point they are arguing against, on these examples of immature outbursts.
The amount of times I have tried to reason with self proclaimed theists, I reckon I have been sent to hell more times than I am for not passing on chain mail.
So for me the internet is getting more and more depressing.....and then I run into websites like ' http://www.pulltheplugonatheism.com/ ', where they say I am a taint on the earth and must be purified. They really know how to make me depressed....

[Tank]

If one takes the view that relative anonymity plays it's part in the interactions you are talking about then the severity of those interactions becomes more understandable. In real life there are usually consequences to being rude, there are very little or none online. I know I'm guilty of saying things online in a way that I wouldn't in RL and that leads to a downward spiral of invective on the part of both parties.

Consider also the type of person visiting the blogs, posts and forums that you do. These are people who care about the issues. In general I think they have a greater person intellectual and/or emotional investment in the subjects than people who don't visit. I would contend that people like us are a self selecting group who like to robustly assert and defend our world view. I would further contend we are a minority of the people who espouse our respective world views and therefore not truly representative of all the people who espouse those world views.

So I would suggest that what you see and what is expressed about you by others are not representative of the majority of the people that hold those opposing world views. Also it's not personal. It's group support and infighting. The best you can do is sate your views and why you hold those world views. The overt responses to your views are pretty much irrelevant but getting your views out there is what counts.

[wildfire_emissary]

every week i'd repost a random comic from jesusandmo.net to my facebook page. people would not comment on the photo but would post comments on my wall like, being sent to hell, the anti-christ. and as i've learned here: obvious troll is obvious.

[wildfire_emissary]

every week i'd repost a random comic from jesusandmo.net to my facebook page. people would not comment on the photo but would post comments on my wall like, yeah, being sent to hell, the anti-christ. and as i've learned here: obvious troll is obvious.

[Killa_Kron]

The big deal here is that people don't like change...ask anyone. Ask them if they would rather have their cup o' joe in the morning or not. You could scream the benefits of not having the coffee till your blue, but they will still have that coffee, either they "need" it or they just don't want to not have it. Same with religion is some cases. If you would rather have a meaning to life than be a tiny dust speck of insignificance...which would you choose? I'm saying this from a theist's point of view. From an atheist's point of view...well there is not a POV for atheists. There are POV's for scientists, POV's for humanists, POV's for Communists, etc.

[Tank]

The big deal here is that people don't like change...ask anyone.

Not strictly the whole truth.



However once a person's basic physical and emotional needs are met there is a 'hysteresis' or static inertia associated with change, the grass has to appear greener on the other side of the fence before you'll make the effort to jump the fence.

[Joe Klooski]

http://www.pulltheplugonatheism.com/

Thanks for giving me a chuckle on that, I will go there everyday now and have a good laugh.

Oh, and if you are suprised that theists don't listen to you and think that atheism is of the devil and only morons follow it, you are in luck!

Realize, that in religious people's brains, the knowledge goes in one ear and out the other. They don't care, and they are blinded through fairy tales, that is why they are theists! So don't worry, bro, they are only fooling themselves. Keep your head up high, tough