DangerousTalkDangerous Talk » The Religious Conversation Pattern

The Religious Conversation Pattern

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 will use logic, reason, and evidence to criticize the claim and show how the claim is false and sometimes even silly. This is where the believer feigns being horribly insulted and tries to make me appear to be attacking them personally rather than the argument they presented. After this, I usually defend my character and again turn back to criticizing the original claim.

Finally, the conversation turns threatening. After all the feigning of peace and love, the religious believer turns to threats. Sometimes those threats are toward physical violence and other times they are directed to my eternal fate but the threats tend to come nonetheless and they don’t come from me.

Religious believers love to talk about how they are all about peace and love, but as soon as you criticize their ideas they often turn violent very quickly.