The fine line between being a bigot and just being annoyed

[tornado]

Would you want to live in an atheist state?  What exactly would an atheist state consist of?  How would violators be dealt with?  Prison?  Expulsion?  Thorazine?   Death by being tickled severly on the errogenous zones with partially cooked spaghettis while being forced to watch all episodes of "American Idol" on high speed so that the high notes shatter the eardrums?

Forced belief systems always end up the same way. No matter what belief is being forced, the enforcers are going to get away with a lot of twisted shit.

[nikkixsugar]

How would violators be dealt with?  Prison?  Expulsion?  Thorazine?   Death by being tickled severly on the errogenous zones with partially cooked spaghettis while being forced to watch all episodes of "American Idol" on high speed so that the high notes shatter the eardrums?

Geez, Lara! They could use you on the Research and development Board at Guantanamo Bay!

[LARA]

Well, I was trying to be a little facetious, but I guess my very bitter side just kinda slipped out there for a bit.  

[afreethinker30]

Since I'm not even half smart enough to join the total mind fuck session of Categorical Moral Imperitives (seriously you guys are blowing my mind  :cool:

Isn't there a point where our hatred of the bigotry of Religon becomes bigotry in itself?  I think it was SteveS who gave us a nice Nietzche quote a while back, something to the effect  of being careful when battling a monster not to become one ourselves.  Not that I'm going to start liking Nietzche or anything.

Does freedom not just include the freedom to speak the truth, but also the freedom to speak what may be unproven?  To say for a moment that 2+2=5 and then try to prove it, if you will?  I'm not saying we have to bow down to bullshit, as religious authorities want to require us to do, but not everything religious authorities teach is really untrue.   Most of us have figured this out and extracted the positives and thrown away the delusions.

Isn't the real issue authoritarianism rather than religion?  I mean not every religious or crazy person is a threat to our freedom, some of them are quite passive in their insanity, so they really aren't really trying to get us to bow down before their craziness.  Isn't the real problem being forced to accept a proposition as fact without questioning and testing of that proposition before we accept it?

Look at China.  This is a country of atheism.  Is this a positive model of society?  I mean that question honestly.  Is enforced atheism the way to go?

Enforced atheism scares me as much as any other enforced belief.   And I'm probably best described as an atheist.  But what I'm really interested in is your opinion.

I agree it shouldn't be enforced.But look at America.Here we sit with a Christian idoit who wants nothing but money and power.His own father says if you are  atheist that you are not a citizen.

"No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered as patriots. This is one nation under God."

.Ok maybe George W. hasn't said this himself,atleast not what I have read.But those in power that say they are for God are the ones screwing us the most.It costs $70 to fill your gas tank,$100 for electric,my gas bill during the winter is scary in the least around $200 a month.Alot of people in Indiana and many other places are losing their homes because of taxes.Alot of schools closed and test scores have gone down.4 months of your yearly paycheck goes towards taxes,and alot of that money is spent funding  :brick:  Our president tells us that to be homosexual is going against God,hell to be anything but a white male is going against God.And some schools are trying to pass creation as science.School is for teaching things we know that will get us by in the world.Unless you plan on becoming a preist,preacher,nun or whatever else it does no good.We have people that say everything is a sin,and because they think it is that means everyone else is to turn away from it to.Ok porn what is the harm??Hmm I've seen more perverts in the church then in my home state.Pat Robertson gets on TV and starts spouting his mouth.

"The Constitution of the United States, for instance, is a marvelous document for self-government by the Christian people. But the minute you turn the document into the hands of non-Christian people and atheistic people they can use it to destroy the very foundation of our society. And that's what's been happening."

.We have women killing their children in the name of God,and a cult leader on every coner it seems.I know there are good Theists out there but our own government is telling us that if you dont believe then you shouldn't be here.It's crap.Americans get upset about it but do nothing.Even America started out with religious force.So many Native Americans lost their lives,because they were demons or the Anti-Christ.I'm sorry for the rant but you can not look at history without seeing forced religion everywhere.Sure some people just live their lives and are good people.But so am I,I have never hurt anyone with malice.I'm not a murder,I'm a good mom and wife.Yet when most people find out that I am not an atheist they assume I'm a person with no moral code.It wouldn't matter if an Atheist is in office,

"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely"

.I don't mean to offend anyone with what I have written by I am tired of having to explain that I am no monster.Just because I do not believe in God.

[LARA]

No apologies needed for ranting     I'm just really glad to hear your opinion.  I started this thread because I am extremely confused about where to stand on this issue and need input from others to get a better mindset on it.

I tend to have a hard time with this issue of where to draw the line in what constitutes religious freedom or freedom of belief in general. I'm not naiive enough to believe that a label "atheist" or "christian" or "buddhist" or what have you means a person is incapable of harming others or being irrational, but I do think if a person suscribes to a doctrine that throws reason out the window, it's not such a good sign about their rationality.  Conversely, I don't view rationality as the end-all goal of human existence.  The fact of the matter is that acting silly and irrational can be fun and life-affirming.

Deep down we are all animals and can be capable of acting in ways that bring that fact into sharp focus, but we sometimes use irrational beliefs to excuse our actions.  People abuse religions to control or harm others, they abuse laws, they even abuse facts, it really doesn't matter.

[Loffler]

China is not a country of atheism. They have many different kind of religions there, including Buddhism ( which is the largest organised religion),

I hope you mean the largest organized religion in China, because it is certainly not the largest organized religion on Earth; Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism are all larger.