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It is not necessarily arguing, but if no one discusses the topics there would be no forum or exchange of ideas.
Discussion and arguing are not the same, IMHO. Discussion of ideas can take place from different perspective, but not necessarily to dismiss or deny any viewpoint, but to understand they exist and can be valid.
Argument is a contest between right and wrong, truth and false, good and bad.
“To be educated is to know how to understand, experience, and respect difference.”
— William Scott Green
I can't condone the atheist wanting to take the faith of the believer. Those seeking to confront the faithful and talk them out of their belief. What are you giving them? If you can't replace their God with something better, then why would you take it from them? If you change their mind, you gain nothing. They lose everything. A nice person should never want to do that.
That's my perspective.
1. Atheists aren't here 'to take the faith of a believer'. What possible reason would we have for doing that?
2. Even if that were the case, which is isn't, no atheist has the ability to do that.
Individuals make up their own minds, nobody can do that for them. If a theists faith is shaken, that's of their own volition. It would have to be a pretty weak kind of faith if someone could just 'talk them out of it'.
3. What makes you think becoming an atheist represents 'losing everything'? What is being lost exactly? Personally, finally realizing I was an atheist was like a great weight being lifted. It's incredibly freeing and liberating.
What we need to realize is that there is a 'right time' for everything - whether it is giving up smoking or anything else. Trying to bring that 'time' forward with logical arguments is useless as the other person will just not accept the information we are providing until their 'right time' arrives.
There is also a 'right way' for different people too, so that a very logical approach may work for some people and may put other people off the subject. Just like we like some authors books and dont like the style of others.
I can't condone the atheist wanting to take the faith of the believer. Those seeking to confront the faithful and talk them out of their belief. What are you giving them? If you can't replace their God with something better, then why would you take it from them? If you change their mind, you gain nothing. They lose everything. A nice person should never want to do that.
I'm glad you're against atheists "taking" people's faith (assuming for the sake of argument that is even possible) because, as an atheist, so am I.
My late / previous wife was a believer to the end, and I wouldn't have tried to deprive her of that even if I could have. Her faith provided her with some sort of comfort, even if it would not have done so for me.
We had conversations about my evolving thinking on the topic of god and the supernatural, of course. If her faith had been the fragile, crumbly little thing that most believers seem to have, these conversations might have changed her thinking, or they might have been threatening to her or changed her opinion of me. But they didn't. Our relationship was based on mutual respect, love and trust, not on our metaphysics.
In my experience -- and I've said it many times -- people don't change until the pain of changing is less than the pain of NOT changing. I reached that pain point as a believer some 25 years ago and left the faith. Many never have, and never will. The abstraction was just way too leaky for me.
The notion that one has to replace god with something better has implicit within it the idea that god has some sort of utility for you. I'm happy for you. He had zero utility for me, in fact negative utility. God did not explain or predict my lived experience and therefore was irrelevant to guiding it. The resulting cognitive dissonance made life harder for me to live, rather than easier. Your mileage can, and will vary. My decision to leave the faith was a combination of my needs, personality, life experiences, and coping style -- yours will be different. It will stand or fall on its actual merits to you, not on my arguments. In my particular case I did not "replace" god with anything, and came out quite a bit ahead in terms of peace of mind and having a mental model of reality that is a much more accurate representation of same.
The ONLY concern I have with people who believe in god is with the ones who feel the need to impose their beliefs, practices, sensibilities and customs on people outside their group. Not just on atheists, but on non-Christian theists, and even on other Christians. I have a problem with those trying to turn the US into a theocracy. But what you get up to in your private clubs, in and of itself, is of neither interest nor concern to me.
I can only speak for myself, but I suspect I'm more or less representative of most atheists.
The ONLY concern I have with people who believe in god is with the ones who feel the need to impose their beliefs, practices, sensibilities and customs on people outside their group. Not just on atheists, but on non-Christian theists, and even on other Christians. I have a problem with those trying to turn the US into a theocracy. But what you get up to in your private clubs, in and of itself, is of neither interest nor concern to me.
I can only speak for myself, but I suspect I'm more or less representative of most atheists.
As a Non-Christian i have never felt any kind of pressure from any source of the kind expressed above. I also feel very comfortable with, and even respected for, my beliefs in a country where religion is recognized as multi-dimensional, multi-ethnic, and equal. Since being on this forum, where atheists express their opinions freely, i have done a mini poll among friends and family, trying not to look foolish, if they have had such pressure laid on them by Christians. Zip, nada, 0.
But then I dont go about proclaiming my belief, i have no such need. A couple of atheists I know have declared themselves to me, unasked. Maybe there is such a need among atheists, a need to be recognized for their special status of non-belief.
As a Non-Christian i have never felt any kind of pressure from any source of the kind expressed above. I also feel very comfortable with, and even respected for, my beliefs in a country where religion is recognized as multi-dimensional, multi-ethnic, and equal. Since being on this forum, where atheists express their opinions freely, i have done a mini poll among friends and family, trying not to look foolish, if they have had such pressure laid on them by Christians. Zip, nada, 0.
But then I dont go about proclaiming my belief, i have no such need. A couple of atheists I know have declared themselves to me, unasked. Maybe there is such a need among atheists, a need to be recognized for their special status of non-belief.
I have brought this up before on the Atheism forum when people have gone on and on about the social pressure to find out where one goes to church, etc. It sounded like a crock to me, too, even though I moved in Christian circles myself. Who the hell asks questions like that? Nobody I ever met.
It's geographical. IIRC, you have said you live in Massachusetts. I have lived most of my life in New Jersey. People don't normally ask those questions or assume you go to a church in our part of the country; in fact, we live in multicultural areas where it would be ridiculous to assume people are Christians. There is a poster on City-Data who is relatively young, in her thirties, who also lives in MA but who grew up in Georgia and had a cross burned on her lawn in her childhood because her family was Jewish. That's not that long ago, 20 - 25 years.
But apparently there really, really are places in our country where people do ask these questions and the pressure to be known as a Christian is considered socially important. Too many credible people have told such stories to be making it up.
Also, I think the phenomenon of atheists speaking up and saying they are atheists is fairly recent. Not that long ago, it would not have been something an atheist would have been free to reveal about themselves without possibly being looked upon with suspicion. It was shocking to the ears of many. Now, as in saying "I'm gay', saying "I'm atheist" in most places will merely solicit a yawn and we would wonder why they felt the need to say these things.
Except, of course, in those parts of the country where people still assume you attend a church and feel free to inquire as to which one you go to.
I have brought this up before on the Atheism forum when people have gone on and on about the social pressure to find out where one goes to church, etc. It sounded like a crock to me, too, even though I moved in Christian circles myself. Who the hell asks questions like that? Nobody I ever met.
It's geographical. IIRC, you have said you live in Massachusetts. I have lived most of my life in New Jersey. People don't normally ask those questions or assume you go to a church in our part of the country; in fact, we live in multicultural areas where it would be ridiculous to assume people are Christians. There is a poster on City-Data who is relatively young, in her thirties, who also lives in MA but who grew up in Georgia and had a cross burned on her lawn in her childhood because her family was Jewish. That's not that long ago, 20 - 25 years.
But apparently there really, really are places in our country where people do ask these questions and the pressure to be known as a Christian is considered socially important. Too many credible people have told such stories to be making it up.
Also, I think the phenomenon of atheists speaking up and saying they are atheists is fairly recent. Not that long ago, it would not have been something an atheist would have been free to reveal about themselves without possibly being looked upon with suspicion. It was shocking to the ears of many. Now, as in saying "I'm gay', saying "I'm atheist" in most places will merely solicit a yawn and we would wonder why they felt the need to say these things.
Except, of course, in those parts of the country where people still assume you attend a church and feel free to inquire as to which one you go to.
I live in West Virginia, which is the northern edge of the Bible Belt. In smaller communities, it would be normal to ask a newcomer what church they belong to. Not being a Christian makes you an outlier. In the cities that's not quite so common. Charleston has two Jewish synagogues, a Greek Orthodox church, a Coptic Orthodox Church, as well as a myriad of the usual Christian churches. The Islamic Center is a few miles away. You still don't see that variety in the small towns.
I've also spent a lot of time in Maine. People there (even devout Christians) think it would be bizarre to ask a stranger if they go to church. They just don't think about that.
I've only known a few people that openly say they are atheists, although I know several others who will imply as much in something less open than the public square.
I have brought this up before on the Atheism forum when people have gone on and on about the social pressure to find out where one goes to church, etc. It sounded like a crock to me, too, even though I moved in Christian circles myself. Who the hell asks questions like that? Nobody I ever met.
It's geographical. IIRC, you have said you live in Massachusetts. I have lived most of my life in New Jersey. People don't normally ask those questions or assume you go to a church in our part of the country; in fact, we live in multicultural areas where it would be ridiculous to assume people are Christians. There is a poster on City-Data who is relatively young, in her thirties, who also lives in MA but who grew up in Georgia and had a cross burned on her lawn in her childhood because her family was Jewish. That's not that long ago, 20 - 25 years.
But apparently there really, really are places in our country where people do ask these questions and the pressure to be known as a Christian is considered socially important. Too many credible people have told such stories to be making it up.
Also, I think the phenomenon of atheists speaking up and saying they are atheists is fairly recent. Not that long ago, it would not have been something an atheist would have been free to reveal about themselves without possibly being looked upon with suspicion. It was shocking to the ears of many. Now, as in saying "I'm gay', saying "I'm atheist" in most places will merely solicit a yawn and we would wonder why they felt the need to say these things.
Except, of course, in those parts of the country where people still assume you attend a church and feel free to inquire as to which one you go to.
The burning of cross in a Jewish house is an extreme act, and a hate crime. Not an attempt at enticing her to convert, i dont think.
There are places I am sure, in LA for example, and North Carolina, where Sunday means Church. Children have friends who belong to the same Sunday school. A non-Christian can feel cut off socially in such places, and I have experienced that. When we were looking for a house our realtor gently steered us out of a particular area saying it was a predominantly Jewish area and we may not feel comfortable. I did not quite understand that at the time. We have lived in Ohio, always had wonderful neighbors and friends, never asked my religion. If I were asked it did not make me uncomfortable. I dont even know what the mix of religion existed there.
Being a non-Christian has not been a problem for me living among Christians. I dont know anyone for whom it was. i know people for whom living in a neighborhood where another religion was dominant was a problem.
I have brought this up before on the Atheism forum when people have gone on and on about the social pressure to find out where one goes to church, etc. It sounded like a crock to me, too, even though I moved in Christian circles myself. Who the hell asks questions like that? Nobody I ever met.
It's geographical. IIRC, you have said you live in Massachusetts. I have lived most of my life in New Jersey. People don't normally ask those questions or assume you go to a church in our part of the country; in fact, we live in multicultural areas where it would be ridiculous to assume people are Christians. There is a poster on City-Data who is relatively young, in her thirties, who also lives in MA but who grew up in Georgia and had a cross burned on her lawn in her childhood because her family was Jewish. That's not that long ago, 20 - 25 years.
But apparently there really, really are places in our country where people do ask these questions and the pressure to be known as a Christian is considered socially important. Too many credible people have told such stories to be making it up.
Also, I think the phenomenon of atheists speaking up and saying they are atheists is fairly recent. Not that long ago, it would not have been something an atheist would have been free to reveal about themselves without possibly being looked upon with suspicion. It was shocking to the ears of many. Now, as in saying "I'm gay', saying "I'm atheist" in most places will merely solicit a yawn and we would wonder why they felt the need to say these things.
Except, of course, in those parts of the country where people still assume you attend a church and feel free to inquire as to which one you go to.
Yes it is geographical, but when I mention believers not allowing non-believers to be as they are, I am talking about a lot of things besides that. Not because they impact me personally at this point in my life, but because they impact a lot of folks. It isn't unusual for one's immediate and sometimes extended family to deploy shunning, or the threat of it, to non-conforming members. It isn't unusual for marriages or lifelong friendships to end. The loss of church social support may be the loss of 100% of one's social support, which is a cost. One can of course pretend to play the roles demanded of them, but that takes a psychic toll all its own.
Apart from that there's all the things we must not speak of here, changing public policy and settled legal precedent to deprive people of various rights and freedoms -- these aren't necessarily anti-atheist but they are anti-not-us, hugely driven by religious ideation, and the same principle applies.
So while "what church do you go to" questions are one particular manifestation of religiously-mediated discrimination against non-Christians, there are many, MANY others. Nothing is requested but for religious people to mind their own business and constrain their need to control others to within their own in-groups. This is a perfectly sane and reasonable request.
I have brought this up before on the Atheism forum when people have gone on and on about the social pressure to find out where one goes to church, etc. It sounded like a crock to me, too, even though I moved in Christian circles myself. Who the hell asks questions like that? Nobody I ever met.
It's geographical. IIRC, you have said you live in Massachusetts. I have lived most of my life in New Jersey. People don't normally ask those questions or assume you go to a church in our part of the country; in fact, we live in multicultural areas where it would be ridiculous to assume people are Christians. There is a poster on City-Data who is relatively young, in her thirties, who also lives in MA but who grew up in Georgia and had a cross burned on her lawn in her childhood because her family was Jewish. That's not that long ago, 20 - 25 years.
But apparently there really, really are places in our country where people do ask these questions and the pressure to be known as a Christian is considered socially important. Too many credible people have told such stories to be making it up.
Also, I think the phenomenon of atheists speaking up and saying they are atheists is fairly recent. Not that long ago, it would not have been something an atheist would have been free to reveal about themselves without possibly being looked upon with suspicion. It was shocking to the ears of many. Now, as in saying "I'm gay', saying "I'm atheist" in most places will merely solicit a yawn and we would wonder why they felt the need to say these things.
Except, of course, in those parts of the country where people still assume you attend a church and feel free to inquire as to which one you go to.
What church I went to was a very common question asked of me in Colorado Springs when I moved there. Once even by a clerk at a grocery store checkout!
Here in Arizona...asked less often, but still more than back in northern Virginia and Maryland, where I lived for much of my life.
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