Happy Atheist Forum

Can one be an Atheist and a Republican? Can one agree with the Republican Party in term of abortion, immigration, Iraq War, national defense, gay marriage, trickle down economy and all that except religions? I wonder how such atheist would be treated in the Republican Party. Any concrete example?

One can be atheist and any political affiliation. One cannot be atheist and religious.

Quote from: "Will"One cannot be atheist and religious.

Found this Wikipedia article about Christian Atheism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism)

Nevertheless, I wouldn't like it if they preach either.

Quote from: "rubberducky"

Quote from: "Will"One cannot be atheist and religious.

Found this Wikipedia article about Christian Atheism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism)

Nevertheless, I wouldn't like it if they preach either.

I'm not sure if we can call Christian Atheism a religion since it would not include a belief in a god or an afterlife.

As a side note, I find it very pointless to try to mold a religion to fit a secular society when we already have secular philosophies which would work just fine.  After all, if you take the goals of christian atheism, they basically just want to remake Christianity into secular humanism.

Quote from: "Whitney"

Quote from: "rubberducky"

Quote from: "Will"One cannot be atheist and religious.

Found this Wikipedia article about Christian Atheism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism)

Nevertheless, I wouldn't like it if they preach either.

I'm not sure if we can call Christian Atheism a religion since it would not include a belief in a god or an afterlife.

As a side note, I find it very pointless to try to mold a religion to fit a secular society when we already have secular philosophies which would work just fine.  After all, if you take the goals of christian atheism, they basically just want to remake Christianity into secular humanism.

Maybe, as long as it doesn't take freedoms away from certain minorities (like gays.) Maybe this is why he is picking "Christian Atheism" over "Secular Humanism"

Quote from: "Will"One can be atheist and any political affiliation. One cannot be atheist and religious.

Do the branches of Buddhism which believe Buddah was not a god yet still believe in an afterlife count as an atheistic religion?

Of course one can be an atheist republican.

A tougher question would look at the possibility of an intelligent republican.  That would be a rare beast indeed.

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You could be an atheist republican, but I doubt that you'd get far in US politics.

Quote from: "Jolly Sapper"You could be an atheist republican, but I doubt that you'd get far in US politics.

Or any openly atheist politician for that matter.

Quote from: "BadPoison"

Quote from: "Jolly Sapper"You could be an atheist republican, but I doubt that you'd get far in US politics.

Or any openly atheist politician for that matter.

Too true

I'm a conservative atheist, which I suppose is a fairly close equivalent.

I disgaree about a lot of moral things the party preaches about, but I like their tax plans and general government philosophy of free markets and minimisng the size of the state.

Same here. I don't like to be called a Conservative, because of my liberal upbringing, but I'm not exactly big on big government beauracracy, if you know what I mean.  

Of course, I still don't vote republican. I hope the libertarian party gets off the ground soon. I'd love to see them in power.

Quote from: "SSY"general government philosophy of free markets and minimisng the size of the state.

:D  :nerd:

Of course, I still don't vote republican. I hope the libertarian party gets off the ground soon. I'd love to see them in power.[/quote]
Ron Paul is a Republican, and he's as Libertarian as they get!

I'll be the first to admit, if my choice was between a Democrat and a Libertarian, I would choose the Libertarian every time.

But that's not my choice. I'm stuck between a Center-Right party and Theocrats.

Also, third parties are a joke. It's not even worth mentioning. Kill one before bringing another into prominence.

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Quote from: "rubberducky"Can one be an Atheist and a Republican? Can one agree with the Republican Party in term of abortion, immigration, Iraq War, national defense, gay marriage, trickle down economy and all that except religions? I wonder how such atheist would be treated in the Republican Party. Any concrete example?

"Republican" has been turned into a dirty word as of late. That being said, I know tons of a-religious and/or atheist republicans. Literally hundreds.

Independents can have a moderate amount of success on state levels, but there need to be more of them (and they have to be successful) before any real federal positions can be filled by them.

The Libertarian Party will never get off the ground. Their platform is too contradictory to be of any benefit and Ron Paul is just batshit insane.He may have been popular when he was Bush bashing during the lat 8 years of federal level stupidity, but hell, even NIXON looked good against that assclown. At least Nixon knew that adding "under God" to the pledge of the allegiance was a violation of the separation of church and state and not only voted against it, but walked out of the session when the legislation was signed by Eisenhower. Ron Paul, on the other hand, wants Creationism taught in US public schools.

Regardless, they are still the closest thing we have to a third party. The Green Party has hopelessly tied its anchor to Ralph Nader who is even battier than Ron Paul.  And the other fringe groups are just loonies.

I'm sure it's possible, just not likely/common.

Big government republicans vs big government democrats...
Both parties are in a horrible state (democrats are worse at this point in time) I want a refund.

The size of a government has nothing to do with the amount of power either the collective government wields or any individual within the government wields. If the amount of power a government wields were related to its size, then the more government there is, then the less power any specific individual within the government would have.

What matters is how answerable the individual officials are to the public. The solution is not more or less government, but rather more elected officials in government and fewer appointees.

"Big" is reffering to the amount of power the govt' wants to wield.  It's a colloquialism for psuedo-authoritarian.

Quote from: "SSY"I'm a conservative atheist, which I suppose is a fairly close equivalent.

I disgaree about a lot of moral things the party preaches about, but I like their tax plans and general government philosophy of free markets and minimisng the size of the state.

I am on board with that thinking as well.

I live in Nashville, so on my way home from work everyday I listen to Phil Valentine. Much of what he says makes sense...but then there are those time where he makes reference to religion(s), and then he starts to lose logic points with me.

I still have a hard time understanding why a party that always talks about logical thinking and the like can base most of their lives on religion. Where is the logic in that?

I would also say that I'm a LIbertarian...I agree mainly with conservatives on fiscal and smaller-gov't ideas, but differ greatly on the their general concepts as to what is morally right and wrong (especially concerning the "why" factor).

Quote from: "SlapMonkey"I still have a hard time understanding why a party that always talks about logical thinking and the like can base most of their lives on religion. Where is the logic in that?

Votes.  They just say what voters want to hear.  Whether it makes sense or not to the well educated they are not the majority of voters.  Guess who their target audience is?  The majority of Christians who hear a few key phrases and say this is who I want.

Personally I believe that both parties are at fault. Instead of listening to the American people and to those who elect them, they become active in things on their own personal agenda. Both parties have their upsides and downsides, no one is perfect but how some of these people get into the position of power their in is just plain astounding.

Quote from: "EvolutionisRight"Personally I believe that both parties are at fault. Instead of listening to the American people and to those who elect them, they become active in things on their own personal agenda. Both parties have their upsides and downsides, no one is perfect but how some of these people get into the position of power their in is just plain astounding.

I agree, which is why I don't claim to be part of any party.

My only big problem with the republican party is that they have been overtaken by the right wing fundamentalist religious people.  I think most of the big issues I have with their views would be resolved if it were not for the religious influence (there would still be issues, just not ones that are nearly as insane).

Quote from: "Whitney"

Quote from: "EvolutionisRight"Personally I believe that both parties are at fault. Instead of listening to the American people and to those who elect them, they become active in things on their own personal agenda. Both parties have their upsides and downsides, no one is perfect but how some of these people get into the position of power their in is just plain astounding.

I agree, which is why I don't claim to be part of any party.

QuoteMy only big problem with the republican party is that they have been overtaken by the right wing fundamentalist religious people. I think most of the big issues I have with their views would be resolved if it were not for the religious influence (there would still be issues, just not ones that are nearly as insane).

QuoteMy only big problem with the republican party is that they have been overtaken by the right wing fundamentalist religious people.

I used to dismiss this as BS but recent observations has lead me to agree with you. On religious/moral standpoints I always somehow seem to be in dissagreement with whatever republican is on tv. I might agree with what they say but then somehow god creeps into the fold. it doesnt change my stance it just leaves me with this feeling of.... :crazy:

Quote from: "G-Roll"Im not saying there isnt an atheist republican at all. But they should try to be on more tv shows, to prevent the image of a right wing fundi takeover.

Yes, there are some of them...not many though (likely because of being annoyed at the religious influence on republicans).  I think they are not on the TV shows because republicans don't want to promote that image; they seem to want to promote the image of a right wing fundi takeover (seriously, I think they do otherwise they'd make a point to speak in opposition to the crazies).  It's the same reason why you don't see any prominent gay republicans...the republicans in charge don't want to be represented by a homosexual.  I'm hoping that they have let the crazy fundie takeover get so bad that even traditional religious people are starting to wonder is going on and work to tone it down a few (or 20) notches.

I'm actually a registered republican myself. Not for their religious beliefs but for fiscal responsibility, lower taxes and a strong military wich should only be used to defend our country instead of invading others. Though getting rid of the taliban and al-qaida are important. Liberals don't seem to get it that they waged war on us first on 9/11. What this administration is doing is sending us back to a pre 9/11 way of thinking and calling the war on terror a man made incident instead. Frankly I wish more people would be outraged because of this crap, almost 3,000 innocent men, women and children were killed for no reason because a bunch of towel wearing jihadists believed they were doing "God's work."

Quote from: "EvolutionisRight"I'm actually a registered republican myself. Not for their religious beliefs but for fiscal responsibility, lower taxes and a strong military wich should only be used to defend our country instead of invading others. Though getting rid of the taliban and al-qaida are important. Liberals don't seem to get it that they waged war on us first on 9/11. What this administration is doing is sending us back to a pre 9/11 way of thinking and calling the war on terror a man made incident instead. Frankly I wish more people would be outraged because of this crap, almost 3,000 innocent men, women and children were killed for no reason because a bunch of towel wearing jihadists believed they were doing "God's work."

And how many of the thousands upon thousands of people have we killed invading Iraq? What did invading and conquering Iraq have to do with finding a couple of terrorists? The Taliban didn't attack the US, al-qaida did and they don't run a country. They isn't the entire middle east, it's a very small extremist group that happens to have it's origins in the middle east. Liberals aren't missing anything, the phrase war on terror is stupid because it's so broad it can apply to anything and give us the moral justification to do whatever we want all in the name of the war on terror and what do you mean by man made incident? Are you saying that we are literally waging a war on terror? So are we going to invade every country that isn't a democracy then? How can you specify anything in a war on terror?

The war on teror is against the islamic jihadists that don't just kill Americans but anyone else that do not bow to their screwed up version of Islam. Liberals aren't much better, they tend to always blame everything on the republican party when in reality both sides are just as equally at fault. Niether side wants to take any responsibility for what they say and do. Instead of bickering and fighting over who's right or wrong, we need to come together and find a solution in which both sides can agree upon.

Quote from: "EvolutionisRight"The war on teror is against the islamic jihadists that don't just kill Americans but anyone else that do not bow to their screwed up version of Islam. Liberals aren't much better, they tend to always blame everything on the republican party when in reality both sides are just as equally at fault. Niether side wants to take any responsibility for what they say and do. Instead of bickering and fighting over who's right or wrong, we need to come together and find a solution in which both sides can agree upon.

Then don't say liberals because liberals don't mean the same thing as Democrat which is what you meant to say i'im sure. So is the war on terror a war on Islam extremism?  The war on terror isn't the same thing as the war in the middle east and quite frankly sounds like some sort of crusade.

Quote from: "Ultima22689"

Quote from: "EvolutionisRight"The war on teror is against the islamic jihadists that don't just kill Americans but anyone else that do not bow to their screwed up version of Islam. Liberals aren't much better, they tend to always blame everything on the republican party when in reality both sides are just as equally at fault. Niether side wants to take any responsibility for what they say and do. Instead of bickering and fighting over who's right or wrong, we need to come together and find a solution in which both sides can agree upon.

Then don't say liberals because liberals don't mean the same thing as Democrat which is what you meant to say i'im sure. So is the war on terror a war on Islam extremism?  The war on terror isn't the same thing as the war in the middle east and quite frankly sounds like some sort of crusade.

My 2cts. In the past I've always been very positive about the Republican Party. Their idea's about smaller governments, less taxes, supporting the economy, foreign politics, etc. appealed to me. Since the 1980's however, the party started to shift to the ultra conservative religious right. Somehow they managed to dumb-down politics to a level that even evangelical Christians could understand it   .

Worse thing is, that this war on terror "thing" was sold by the RP to the US citizens as an act of patriotism, even though most "facts" presented to us to support the war on terror, were based on lies. And the Christians in that party have always seen this war as a crusade against the Muslim world. I find that extremely irresponsible and scary. So, what did the war on terror accomplish? 1. an illegal invasion of a neutral country (Iraq), 2. thousands of people killed (242,218 according to Wikipedia), 3. civil rights restricted by the governments, 4. huge financial debts to support the war machine, 5. ordinary Muslims becoming more radical, 6. alienation of western partners, etc. etc. Not really something to feel very proud or patriotic about, isn't it?

I do have some ideas of how we can solve the problems in the Middle East, but some of these ideas might be too radical to post on this forum. Basically, I believe that no-one in the Middle East is happy about our presence there, so I think it is a good idea to leave these countries alone and let them fix their own problems. However, we should then officially apologize for the mess that we've created and offer the people (not their corrupt governments) of these countries financial support (for building up schools, houses, hospitals and everything else that was destroyed during the war on terror).

Quote from: "Tom62"

Quote from: "Ultima22689"

Quote from: "EvolutionisRight"The war on teror is against the islamic jihadists that don't just kill Americans but anyone else that do not bow to their screwed up version of Islam. Liberals aren't much better, they tend to always blame everything on the republican party when in reality both sides are just as equally at fault. Niether side wants to take any responsibility for what they say and do. Instead of bickering and fighting over who's right or wrong, we need to come together and find a solution in which both sides can agree upon.

Then don't say liberals because liberals don't mean the same thing as Democrat which is what you meant to say i'im sure. So is the war on terror a war on Islam extremism?  The war on terror isn't the same thing as the war in the middle east and quite frankly sounds like some sort of crusade.

My 2cts. In the past I've always been very positive about the Republican Party. Their idea's about smaller governments, less taxes, supporting the economy, foreign politics, etc. appealed to me. Since the 1980's however, the party started to shift to the ultra conservative religious right. Somehow they managed to dumb-down politics to a level that even evangelical Christians could understand it   .

Worse thing is, that this war on terror "thing" was sold by the RP to the US citizens as an act of patriotism, even though most "facts" presented to us to support the war on terror, were based on lies. And the Christians in that party have always seen this war as a crusade against the Muslim world. I find that extremely irresponsible and scary. So, what did the war on terror accomplish? 1. an illegal invasion of a neutral country (Iraq), 2. thousands of people killed (242,218 according to Wikipedia), 3. civil rights restricted by the governments, 4. huge financial debts to support the war machine, 5. ordinary Muslims becoming more radical, 6. alienation of western partners, etc. etc. Not really something to feel very proud or patriotic about, isn't it?

I do have some ideas of how we can solve the problems in the Middle East, but some of these ideas might be too radical to post on this forum. Basically, I believe that no-one in the Middle East is happy about our presence there, so I think it is a good idea to leave these countries alone and let them fix their own problems. However, we should then officially apologize for the mess that we've created and offer the people (not their corrupt governments) of these countries financial support (for building up schools, houses, hospitals and everything else that was destroyed during the war on terror).

Aww, come on, tell us those ideas! You mind PMing them to me?

Quote from: "Ultima22689"Aww, come on, tell us those ideas! You mind PMing them to me?

OK, but take my ideas with a grain of salt.

The main problem with the Middle East is that the religions keeps the hate flowing. Jews against Muslims; Muslims against Christians; Muslims against Muslims, etc.,  etc. The only way to solve the problem is to either isolate the warring factions from each other, eradicating the enemy from the face of the Earth or by a complete, religious reeducation of the population.

The Israelis are already building a wall to separate them from the Palestine population. I'm personally in favor of building also a wall around Israel to separate them from the rest of the Middle East and from us. A similar wall could than be build between the Middle East and Europe. We could also physically relocate the Israelis to an artificial island that we could build far away from any Muslim population. That makes it easier for us to keep an eye on them.

A less humane solution would be to eradicate the enemy completely. Maybe people will complain for a period of time, but after a couple of decades no-one really cares any more that you committed genocide. For example: I don't think there are many people in the West, who (in their hearts) would be opposed against using major parts of Afghanistan for nuclear bomb tests. It would change that miserable country in a wonderful big parking lot for the US army   .

The idea of reeducation could be executed the slow- and humane way or the totalitarian regime way. It all depends on how fast we would like to see any positive results. The best would be to remove any religious teachings from the minds of all the people, but that might be too much work. It would be "easier" to convert, let's say the Jews in Israel to the Muslim believe than all the Jews and Muslims in the Middle East to Atheism. The slow- and humane way would be to brainwash all Jewish teachers and rabbis, so that they will start to teach from the Qur'an instead of the Torah. After a couple of generations, the Jewish religion will no longer exist and the Israelis can live happily together with their Muslim brothers in the Middle East. The total regime way would be to eliminate any one who have been "infected"  with the "false" religion. The remainder of the population (mainly children) could than be taught the "right" religion.

Interesting, I think you have some good ideas which are likely the only ones that will work. Every once in awhile you have to think like Spock, you may become a cold heartless being but you'll get a lot more done. Is it weird to brush aside all of the morality and emotion for an hour or so so you can think about the world more clearly?