Posted on August 25th, 2011 by Staks
Roger Barr is an atheist who up until recently worked at Walmart as a greeter. Despite his positive job performance, he was fired because he posted controversial opinions on his facebook page. While it wasn’t Roger’s atheist in particular that got him fired, I am sure it was a contributing factor. Roger is known for […]
Filed under: Blasphemy, censorship, conversation, discrimination, facebook, free speech | 4 Comments »
Posted on August 18th, 2011 by Staks
It started with some punk Christian asserting that without God there can be no moral grounding. We have all heard that one before and so I responded with my Atheism 101 article on the subject (which is now out of date, but still useful). Then the Christian responded with this: “As far as your argument […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, debate, discussion, humanism, morality | 7 Comments »
Posted on July 22nd, 2011 by Staks
Yesterday, I saw a great video on YouTube by Dusty Smith. In the video he talks about the claim Christians often make that atheists believe in nothing. Then, last night I attended my local monthly atheist meetup group. If atheists believe in nothing, then a social group of atheist must have nothing to talk about. […]
Filed under: atheism, conversation, discussion, People of Reason | 1 Comment »
Posted on July 20th, 2011 by Staks
It was just a few weeks ago that a Christian commented to me that, “The internet has actually worsened god’s world because science is spread quicker than the truth.” And now Christian apologist Josh McDowell has pretty much come out and said the same thing… to an audience of Christians no less. I love these […]
Filed under: Alternative Worldview, Coexist, conversation, culture war, Decline of Religion, education, People of Reason, Skepticism | 2 Comments »
Posted on July 15th, 2011 by Staks
I once heard it said that the internet is where religions go to die. This is pretty accurate and as religious believers become less lazy they will soon realize that any question they have for atheists has already been answered. All they have to do is Google their question and pick a fairly reputable website […]
Filed under: conversation, culture war, Disproving God, god, Religion, truth | 8 Comments »
Posted on July 13th, 2011 by Staks
A while ago, I posted an open letter to fundamentalist Christian evangelist and actor, Stephen Baldwin. I remember watching an episode of Saturday Night Live in which Stephen’s brother, Alec actually joked about how he isn’t as religious as his brother. But a few days ago, Alec made it clear that he was religious and […]
Filed under: atheism, conversation, Disproving God, twitter | No Comments »
Posted on July 6th, 2011 by Staks
I would say that the single most common message I get from Christians is usually in two parts. The first part is an expression of love and the second part is a threat of eternal torture. This is of course not the first time I have written about this however, the title of my Atheism […]
Filed under: Authority, conversation, culture war, delusion, Disproving God, forgiveness, Love, Religion, Religious Manipulation | 3 Comments »
Posted on June 13th, 2011 by Staks
Over the weekend, I was having a conversation with a Christian over twitter. Nothing beats twitter for intellectual conversations in which you have to simplify your points down to 140 characters. The Christian in question told me that he considers himself to be a reasonably intelligent person. Toward the end of the conversation he asked […]
Filed under: conversation, culture war, Religious Manipulation, Self-Help | 7 Comments »
Posted on June 7th, 2011 by Staks
Many religious leaders have educated themselves a good deal in the history of their religion. I find that the more people learn about religion the less literal they take their holy books. However, there is a divide between the intellectual religious leaders and the common practitioners. What I mean here is that many religious leaders […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, Authority, conversation, ignorance, Preaching, Religious Manipulation, responsibility | 3 Comments »
Posted on June 3rd, 2011 by Staks
I get into a lot of conversations with Christians and often times when the Christian gets backed into an intellectual corner and their ideas have been shown to be unreasonable, illogical, and flat out ridiculous, they throw up a brick wall. One of the most common brick wall tactics is to insist that I open […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, Belief, conversation, delusion, discussion, faith, Glory to God, god, Personal, prayer, Religion, Religious Manipulation | 3 Comments »
Posted on May 27th, 2011 by Staks
Every once in a while, when I criticize the ridiculous beliefs of religious believers, some atheist comes along to complain that I am not respecting these ridiculous beliefs and I am being intolerant. They blame me for the reason Christians hate atheists. Occasionally, I even get someone who self-righteously proclaims that everyone is entitled to […]
Filed under: atheism, conversation, humanism, People of Reason | 3 Comments »
Posted on May 26th, 2011 by Staks
With all the talk about the Rapture lately, one Christian sent me a message saying that he believes Harold Camping was wrong, but that the lesson we should learn is that we ought to live everyday as if it were our last. He says that this is the message Jesus was trying to send with […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, responsibility, Self-Help, The Future | No Comments »
Posted on May 18th, 2011 by Staks
One of the things I love about being the Minority Election Inspector in a heavily Catholic Republican district on Primary Day is that I get a glimpse inside “enemy lines.” Not to say that I consider the people I work with enemies, I don’t. However, I do consider their affiliations to be enemy affiliations. First, […]
Filed under: Catholics, Church, church/state, conversation, culture war, Obama, Personal, Politics | No Comments »
Posted on May 12th, 2011 by Staks
One tactic that I often run into when discussing religion with the religious is a variation of the old sports strategy called, “running the clock.” The idea is to load the atheist up with stuff and waste our time. Here are a few examples: The most common example is when religious believers simply make multiple […]
Filed under: context, conversation, debate, discussion, Religion | No Comments »
Posted on April 19th, 2011 by Staks
A lot of fundamentalist religious believers are fond of telling me that life has no means to me when they don’t even know anything about me except for my lack of belief in their deity of choice. Aside from the arrogance of such a claim, it is also completely false. Theists should be careful with […]
Filed under: conversation, death, ignorance, Projection, Religion | 1 Comment »
Posted on April 15th, 2011 by Staks
Many times when I am discussing religion with the religious, I talk about how the Bible does not support critical thinking and instead praises faith over reason. This to me is one of the biggest problems with religion. Every once in a while however a Christian will tell me that the Bible supports reason and […]
Filed under: atheism, Authority, conversation, discussion, logic, Religion | 2 Comments »
Posted on April 13th, 2011 by Staks
There seems to be a pattern to many of the conversations I have with religious believers. It doesn’t even matter if the believer is a fundamentalist or a mainstream believer; the conversation is usually the same in this regard. First, the religious believer will make some ridiculous claim based on their fictional book. Then I […]
Filed under: conversation, discussion, Religion | No Comments »
Posted on March 23rd, 2011 by Staks
Most Christians will attempt to argue their position using some semblance of reason, logic, and evidence. There are however a small but special few who will not even bother. These few, proud, believers will admit that all the evidence, logic, and reason in the world will not convince them of anything… god related of course. […]
Filed under: Alternative Worldview, anti-intellectualism, conversation, Religion, Religious Manipulation | 5 Comments »
Posted on March 17th, 2011 by Staks
I find that after I write an article of blog entry, Christians tend to be the first to misrepresent something I said and assume the worst. When I read a theist article (even one which I know I will comment on critically or write an entire response to), I tend to read carefully the parts […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, debate, discussion, language | 3 Comments »
Posted on March 14th, 2011 by Staks
One of the things I notice a lot when discussing religion with theists is that they tend to be quick to start with the name calling. When this happens, I like to call attention to it and then move on with the discussion. I don’t think it is productive to name call back but they […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, language, Religious Manipulation | 4 Comments »
Posted on March 11th, 2011 by Staks
Once again we come to the conversation about how critical atheists should be when criticizing religion with the religious. It seems that some atheists think I should be more respectful of the religious and realize that they sometimes feel personally attacked when their beliefs are criticized. I realize this, but that doesn’t mean that I […]
Filed under: atheism, conversation, Criticism, Offensiveness, Religion | 6 Comments »
Posted on March 9th, 2011 by Staks
Often times I use emotion and passion in my arguments. I find that when dealing with theists, this generally works best. But I think it is important to remain unemotional while doing it. To put it another way, one can argue with emotion while remaining unemotional. People (especially religious people) tend to be swayed by […]
Filed under: conversation, debate, discussion, language, Star wars | No Comments »
Posted on March 8th, 2011 by Staks
It seems that theists aren’t always the ones who lack reason. Many times even normally reasonable atheists fall into the trap of using anecdotal evidence to justify an irrational belief. The old, “it works for me” claim is not actually evidence! I usually hear religious people and new age people make the claim that something […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, logic | 3 Comments »
Posted on March 3rd, 2011 by Staks
The other day, I got an e-mail from an anonymous Christians which was short and to the point. The two word e-mail said, “Jesus Rules.” I was not really in the mood for debate, so I thought I would have some fun with the guy instead. I was surprised that I actually changed the conversation […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, debate, discussion, Religion | 2 Comments »
Posted on March 2nd, 2011 by Staks
What do Christians hope to accomplish when they start an argument with an atheist? Do they think they are going to convince us with no evidence that some ridiculous ancient story is obviously true? They know that we know a lot about religion and we have probably heard all their arguments before they even come […]
Filed under: atheism, conversation, de-conversion, debate, discussion, ignorance, Religion | 9 Comments »
Posted on February 21st, 2011 by Staks
Over the weekend, I had a little problem with a particular Christian. A few weeks ago, a Christian e-mailed me asking for a collaborative project where we each ask each other 5 questions on our Examiner pages and then we each answer them. The way it was pitched to me, we would refrain from personal […]
Filed under: Alternative Worldview, anti-intellectualism, Coexist, conversation, debate, Personal, Religion | 4 Comments »
Posted on February 14th, 2011 by Staks
Sometime last year I promised a friend that this Valentines Day I would tell the tale of the Braveheart Question. This could be a tale of romance or it could be the tale of a demented psycho stalker. That, my friends, is the question. The film Braveheart is now considered pretty old by some standards, […]
Filed under: conversation, discussion, Love, Personal, Valentines Day | 17 Comments »
Posted on February 11th, 2011 by Staks
I often hear the argument from Christians that because I spend so much time thinking about and arguing against their imaginary deity, I must secretly believe. One Christian even told me yesterday, that I haven’t sufficiently convinced him that I was an atheist (as if I had to convince him I don’t believe). So it […]
Filed under: conversation, Religion, truth | 11 Comments »
Posted on February 1st, 2011 by Staks
I got into a conversation with a Christian yesterday and the guy said to me, “There are countless things that we could not scientifically prove, that does not mean that they don’t exist.” It is this type of argument that really pisses me off. This guy isn’t even a fundamentalist. He is a mainstream Christian […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, faith, ignorance, Religion, science | 8 Comments »
Posted on January 31st, 2011 by Staks
One of the things that really annoys me about fundamentalist Christians is that they often have an ignorance of an entire field of study; sometimes multiple fields of study. But Ethics in particular seems to be a field that many Christians aren’t even aware exists. It is not unusual for me to be in a […]
Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, education, ignorance, morality, Religion | 3 Comments »