News:

Testamonial:  And i have actually gone to a bar and had a bouncer try to start a fight with me on the way in. I broke his teeth out of his fucking mouth and put his face through a passenger side window of a car.

Guess thats what the Internet was build for, pussy motherfuckers taking shit in safety...

Main Menu

Atheists and White Supremacists

Started by Mesozoic Mister Nigel, October 23, 2013, 04:56:21 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Nephew Twiddleton

Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on October 25, 2013, 03:45:12 AM
I went looking for the condom thing, and found this:



ENGLAND!  WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON OVER THERE?

There's one of Batman climbing the Parliament building somewhere too. They like to dress up as superheros because nothing says men's rights like wearing your underwear incorrectly and throwing baby powder condoms.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 03:47:33 AM


There's one of Batman climbing the Parliament building somewhere too. They like to dress up as superheros because nothing says men's rights like wearing your underwear incorrectly and throwing baby powder condoms.

I have been asking for the background on that baby powder condom thing.

I can't find it anywhere.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Kai on October 25, 2013, 03:11:45 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 03:07:10 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:04:51 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 02:35:28 AM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 25, 2013, 01:38:40 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 12:34:43 AM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 25, 2013, 12:22:29 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on January 01, 1970, 01:00:00 AMBelief specifically in neptune might be dumb.

Why?
If he is understood to be some guy swimming around in the mediterranean causing earthquakes them that is a rather strange belief. Just as strange as the idea of jehovah having a literal cease and cloud throne.

I'll concede that a literal reading of, let's say, Homer probably isn't very representative of reality.  However, isn't it possible that Neptune does exist even if he doesn't have a beard and sea throne just like Jehovah not having a beard and cloud throne doesn't automatically discount the existence of God?  And ultimately isn't the idea of multiple gods just as possible as a single God?

I don't mean to single you out, Twid, but I've noticed that most people who believe in some form of deity (or a variation thereof) but don't subscribe to an established religion tend to believe in a monotheistic deity (or consciousness, spirit, being, etc).  I'm curious why that is. Is the idea that a single God created the universe, set it in motion, and then stepped back any more or less possible than a group of deities doing the same?  Is the idea that the universe as a whole is one massive organism any more or less possible than the idea that each individual galaxy is an organism, and the universe as a whole is simply a school of organisms swimming through the cosmic sea?

A lot of people throughout history, at least European and Near Eastern history, tend to gravitate towards monotheism.  I wonder why that is.  I wonder what about our human nature leads us towards the idea that a single deity is more logical or more possible than multiple deities.   But isn't there the same amount of evidence for polytheism as there is for monotheism?  I accept that God might exist because there's no proof to the contrary.  But couldn't the same be said for multiple gods?  Or maybe some kind of infinite number of animistic spirits?  For all we know the Big Bang could be what happens when a celestial Mike fires up the misaligned cosmic ball mill.

Or maybe it just seems like our nature drives us towards monotheism because I live in a culture/hemisphere that has had a lot of contact with monotheism throughout history?

It was pretty much just one sun baked desert tribe that made the leap from "Our god is better than your god" to "Our god is perfect in ways we can't even describe. Your god just plain doesn't exist." The practice of telling people that their god(s) don't exist became extremely popular over the next couple millennia, to the point where people would seek out new territories on the off chance they could discover people and tell them their god(s) don't exist. Then said people got really good at sailing to new territories, and now the various empires of "Knock, knock, your god is fake" control most of Europe, Africa, the Americas, and dryer and colder parts of Asia.

The surviving major power bases of polytheism, pantheism, and functional atheism ("Gods are very real, but they play no part in salvation/enlightenment) are all in Asia. India traditionally hasn't been very evangelical, except for Buddhism. China recently went through a phase where it decided to disbelieve in gods, agriculture, and economics all at the same time, and it's taking some time for them and their neighbors to recover from the entirely predictable results of that.

Follow-up to add:
The new wave atheists who do nothing but go around telling people they're stupid for believing in g/God(s) can thus be thought of as the 4th Abrahamic religion, taking the seed idea of "{God} doesn't exist" from monotheism and extending it to its logical conclusion of no god existing.

Small a atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities.
Large A Atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities and that's the no-God's honest Truth.

Kai's Atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities, and discovered that there were more important things to care about after making that choice, namely the well being of other humans. And anyone who doesn't like my use of the word can wank off. That's the no-God's honest Truth.

You might consider saying something to the Atheists who like to bandy the word about as an umbrella that covers their bigotry. I'll explain why sometime. But not tonight, I have a pretty lady to meet for drinks.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:13:57 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 02:11:17 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 02:05:08 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 12:56:08 AM
Quote from: Jet City Hustle on October 25, 2013, 12:53:26 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 12:51:06 AM
Quote from: Jet City Hustle on October 25, 2013, 12:43:30 AM
See, I think the idea that the universe has to contain purpose is a strange belief. But there's a reason why I never bring this shit up in polite conversation so we'll probably just have to agree to disagree.

The universe contains more than enough purpose to blow my mind without ever involving anything supernatural. We don't stand a chance of understanding even our own tiny corner of the universe, let alone the fantastic order that is the rest of it. Ever. Let alone why or whether there even is a reason. IMO.

Agreed, though I was using the word "purpose" more in the context of agency.

For all I know, we're all part of a much larger organism that has agency. I think Kai has mentioned something along those lines in the past as well, as have many others in other contexts.

Although I doubt such an organism would be any more conscious of its cellular processes than we are of ours.

I'm willing to be shown wrong, but this superorganism agent sounds a lot like constructions philosophy majors come up with when they want a diety that is buzzword-compatible with what they think their friends do in science class, whose existence they can defend pedantically in class, but is ultimately meaningless and of no consequence to humans even if true.

Does believing that a higher level structures humans are a part of can be meaningfully described as an organism, and that said organism has agency, change anything about the way you live your life? For all the flack religions get about their beliefs not bing falsifiable, they do impact their followers' behavior. If there is a god that is a the ultimate source of truth about how humans should behave, it is of cosmic importance that humans know what that god wants them to do. Abrahamic religions devote considerable resources to that task. If the universe and everything in it are all reflections of a unified source, then self reflection and purifying yourself really does improve the whole universe. Buddhists and some Hindus spend a lot of time meditating. If there really is an afterlife based on your successes in this world, then it makes sense to bury people with lots of really cool grave goods. That's exactly what we find when we crack open burial sites across the ancient world.

What does all this purpose and agency floating around in the universe imply about what you think or do, besides feel more spiritually connected than those poor, insecure atheists?

How could I, or anyone, show you wrong about something that isn't even a hypothesis so much as airy speculations? I neither believe nor disbelieve in the idea that life as we know it is part of a larger living organism with agency, though I will say that life as we know it contributes to ever-larger systems, and that is observable. I have no idea what happens on a scale larger than we can observe, and as I mentioned previously I have little reason to care.

You can have "spiritual connection", which I think is better simply termed "connection", without faith or belief in deities or purpose or a "higher agency".

Sorry, I misread you. ECH said that he thought believing the universe having purpose was strange, and you responded by asserting that the universe has lots of purpose without really explaining why. I thought you were going somewhere with it.

I can't explain why, hence

QuoteWe don't stand a chance of understanding even our own tiny corner of the universe, let alone the fantastic order that is the rest of it. Ever. Let alone why or whether there even is a reason.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Kai

Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 03:50:17 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 25, 2013, 03:11:45 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 03:07:10 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:04:51 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 02:35:28 AM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 25, 2013, 01:38:40 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 12:34:43 AM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 25, 2013, 12:22:29 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on January 01, 1970, 01:00:00 AMBelief specifically in neptune might be dumb.

Why?
If he is understood to be some guy swimming around in the mediterranean causing earthquakes them that is a rather strange belief. Just as strange as the idea of jehovah having a literal cease and cloud throne.

I'll concede that a literal reading of, let's say, Homer probably isn't very representative of reality.  However, isn't it possible that Neptune does exist even if he doesn't have a beard and sea throne just like Jehovah not having a beard and cloud throne doesn't automatically discount the existence of God?  And ultimately isn't the idea of multiple gods just as possible as a single God?

I don't mean to single you out, Twid, but I've noticed that most people who believe in some form of deity (or a variation thereof) but don't subscribe to an established religion tend to believe in a monotheistic deity (or consciousness, spirit, being, etc).  I'm curious why that is. Is the idea that a single God created the universe, set it in motion, and then stepped back any more or less possible than a group of deities doing the same?  Is the idea that the universe as a whole is one massive organism any more or less possible than the idea that each individual galaxy is an organism, and the universe as a whole is simply a school of organisms swimming through the cosmic sea?

A lot of people throughout history, at least European and Near Eastern history, tend to gravitate towards monotheism.  I wonder why that is.  I wonder what about our human nature leads us towards the idea that a single deity is more logical or more possible than multiple deities.   But isn't there the same amount of evidence for polytheism as there is for monotheism?  I accept that God might exist because there's no proof to the contrary.  But couldn't the same be said for multiple gods?  Or maybe some kind of infinite number of animistic spirits?  For all we know the Big Bang could be what happens when a celestial Mike fires up the misaligned cosmic ball mill.

Or maybe it just seems like our nature drives us towards monotheism because I live in a culture/hemisphere that has had a lot of contact with monotheism throughout history?

It was pretty much just one sun baked desert tribe that made the leap from "Our god is better than your god" to "Our god is perfect in ways we can't even describe. Your god just plain doesn't exist." The practice of telling people that their god(s) don't exist became extremely popular over the next couple millennia, to the point where people would seek out new territories on the off chance they could discover people and tell them their god(s) don't exist. Then said people got really good at sailing to new territories, and now the various empires of "Knock, knock, your god is fake" control most of Europe, Africa, the Americas, and dryer and colder parts of Asia.

The surviving major power bases of polytheism, pantheism, and functional atheism ("Gods are very real, but they play no part in salvation/enlightenment) are all in Asia. India traditionally hasn't been very evangelical, except for Buddhism. China recently went through a phase where it decided to disbelieve in gods, agriculture, and economics all at the same time, and it's taking some time for them and their neighbors to recover from the entirely predictable results of that.

Follow-up to add:
The new wave atheists who do nothing but go around telling people they're stupid for believing in g/God(s) can thus be thought of as the 4th Abrahamic religion, taking the seed idea of "{God} doesn't exist" from monotheism and extending it to its logical conclusion of no god existing.

Small a atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities.
Large A Atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities and that's the no-God's honest Truth.

Kai's Atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities, and discovered that there were more important things to care about after making that choice, namely the well being of other humans. And anyone who doesn't like my use of the word can wank off. That's the no-God's honest Truth.

You might consider saying something to the Atheists who like to bandy the word about as an umbrella that covers their bigotry. I'll explain why sometime. But not tonight, I have a pretty lady to meet for drinks.

I do. They don't like that very much. They like a strict dictionary definition, which is amoral and therefore allows them to be douchecanoes. This is contrary to the PZ Myers school of Atheism, which asks, "Okay, we're on board that there are no gods, now what?" and proceeds to be pretty much humanism from there on out. It's a huge fight right now, between the shitbags and people who want the shitbags to fuck off. I posted a link earlier in this thre...oh, I just realized: were you talking about people on here?
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Golden Applesauce

Quote from: Kai on October 25, 2013, 03:40:31 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:34:38 AM
What is an MRA?  :?

Male/Men's Rights Activist. Yes, they are exactly what they sound like.

Ohhh, those guys. Yeah I can see why people would take issue with them.

I'm curious how they link a-theism to male rights. Does it involve lots of "evolutionary psychology" ?
Q: How regularly do you hire 8th graders?
A: We have hired a number of FORMER 8th graders.

Kai

Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 04:17:52 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 25, 2013, 03:40:31 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:34:38 AM
What is an MRA?  :?

Male/Men's Rights Activist. Yes, they are exactly what they sound like.

Ohhh, those guys. Yeah I can see why people would take issue with them.

I'm curious how they link a-theism to male rights. Does it involve lots of "evolutionary psychology" ?

Always. Prime material for Pick-Up Artists (PUAs) as well.
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Nephew Twiddleton

Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 03:51:40 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:13:57 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 02:11:17 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 02:05:08 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 12:56:08 AM
Quote from: Jet City Hustle on October 25, 2013, 12:53:26 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 12:51:06 AM
Quote from: Jet City Hustle on October 25, 2013, 12:43:30 AM
See, I think the idea that the universe has to contain purpose is a strange belief. But there's a reason why I never bring this shit up in polite conversation so we'll probably just have to agree to disagree.

The universe contains more than enough purpose to blow my mind without ever involving anything supernatural. We don't stand a chance of understanding even our own tiny corner of the universe, let alone the fantastic order that is the rest of it. Ever. Let alone why or whether there even is a reason. IMO.

Agreed, though I was using the word "purpose" more in the context of agency.

For all I know, we're all part of a much larger organism that has agency. I think Kai has mentioned something along those lines in the past as well, as have many others in other contexts.

Although I doubt such an organism would be any more conscious of its cellular processes than we are of ours.

I'm willing to be shown wrong, but this superorganism agent sounds a lot like constructions philosophy majors come up with when they want a diety that is buzzword-compatible with what they think their friends do in science class, whose existence they can defend pedantically in class, but is ultimately meaningless and of no consequence to humans even if true.

Does believing that a higher level structures humans are a part of can be meaningfully described as an organism, and that said organism has agency, change anything about the way you live your life? For all the flack religions get about their beliefs not bing falsifiable, they do impact their followers' behavior. If there is a god that is a the ultimate source of truth about how humans should behave, it is of cosmic importance that humans know what that god wants them to do. Abrahamic religions devote considerable resources to that task. If the universe and everything in it are all reflections of a unified source, then self reflection and purifying yourself really does improve the whole universe. Buddhists and some Hindus spend a lot of time meditating. If there really is an afterlife based on your successes in this world, then it makes sense to bury people with lots of really cool grave goods. That's exactly what we find when we crack open burial sites across the ancient world.

What does all this purpose and agency floating around in the universe imply about what you think or do, besides feel more spiritually connected than those poor, insecure atheists?

How could I, or anyone, show you wrong about something that isn't even a hypothesis so much as airy speculations? I neither believe nor disbelieve in the idea that life as we know it is part of a larger living organism with agency, though I will say that life as we know it contributes to ever-larger systems, and that is observable. I have no idea what happens on a scale larger than we can observe, and as I mentioned previously I have little reason to care.

You can have "spiritual connection", which I think is better simply termed "connection", without faith or belief in deities or purpose or a "higher agency".

Sorry, I misread you. ECH said that he thought believing the universe having purpose was strange, and you responded by asserting that the universe has lots of purpose without really explaining why. I thought you were going somewhere with it.

I can't explain why, hence

QuoteWe don't stand a chance of understanding even our own tiny corner of the universe, let alone the fantastic order that is the rest of it. Ever. Let alone why or whether there even is a reason.

This is why I'm fairly flexible about my definition of God (indeed, part of my spiritual exploration is to try and get a better sense of it) and admitting that my theism is rooted in a gut feeling (and, admittedly, an extreme discomfort with mortality, even for a human).

And it really is a gut feeling. Some people are just wired spiritually and others wired atheistically. A person with an inquisitive mind from either category will look at the universe, marvel and admire just the same, but see two completely different things. Carl Sagan (yes, I do have a hard on for him, whatever) I think said something about a puddle of water marveling at how well it fits the hole it sits in and ascribes agency to how optimal the shape of the hole is. That's a fallacy, obviously. Of course the water fits the hole, as the atheist will argue, as Sagan did. My position is, of course the water fits the hole. It's a hole. How did the water get there?

Of course Earth is suited for life as we know it. It's our friggin hole. I'm in agreement with an atheistic model of the universe up until life comes into being. Because once life comes into being, complex chemical structures develop agency. My sense that there is some sort of God, whatever God may mean ultimately has nothing to do with the fact that the universe exists, but rather that life can be found in it at all. Once chemistry develops a sense of self-perpetuation, things get weird. Even if God was born the exact moment that life came into being, that means that there is a purpose and direction to an otherwise meaningless universe. I'm probably not explaining it right, but at the end of the day, the atheist and the theist look at the same thing and say wow for different reasons.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

Nephew Twiddleton

Roger and I believe in some sort of God.

I don't know what Roger's definition of God is, but I can assume he and I generally agree that there is some higher meaning to the universe than he and I are aware of. We can't explain why, that's just what we feel, and we can't shake that feeling.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Kai on October 25, 2013, 04:02:55 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on October 25, 2013, 03:50:17 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 25, 2013, 03:11:45 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 03:07:10 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 03:04:51 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on October 25, 2013, 02:35:28 AM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 25, 2013, 01:38:40 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on October 25, 2013, 12:34:43 AM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 25, 2013, 12:22:29 AM
Quote from: Doktor Blight on January 01, 1970, 01:00:00 AMBelief specifically in neptune might be dumb.

Why?
If he is understood to be some guy swimming around in the mediterranean causing earthquakes them that is a rather strange belief. Just as strange as the idea of jehovah having a literal cease and cloud throne.

I'll concede that a literal reading of, let's say, Homer probably isn't very representative of reality.  However, isn't it possible that Neptune does exist even if he doesn't have a beard and sea throne just like Jehovah not having a beard and cloud throne doesn't automatically discount the existence of God?  And ultimately isn't the idea of multiple gods just as possible as a single God?

I don't mean to single you out, Twid, but I've noticed that most people who believe in some form of deity (or a variation thereof) but don't subscribe to an established religion tend to believe in a monotheistic deity (or consciousness, spirit, being, etc).  I'm curious why that is. Is the idea that a single God created the universe, set it in motion, and then stepped back any more or less possible than a group of deities doing the same?  Is the idea that the universe as a whole is one massive organism any more or less possible than the idea that each individual galaxy is an organism, and the universe as a whole is simply a school of organisms swimming through the cosmic sea?

A lot of people throughout history, at least European and Near Eastern history, tend to gravitate towards monotheism.  I wonder why that is.  I wonder what about our human nature leads us towards the idea that a single deity is more logical or more possible than multiple deities.   But isn't there the same amount of evidence for polytheism as there is for monotheism?  I accept that God might exist because there's no proof to the contrary.  But couldn't the same be said for multiple gods?  Or maybe some kind of infinite number of animistic spirits?  For all we know the Big Bang could be what happens when a celestial Mike fires up the misaligned cosmic ball mill.

Or maybe it just seems like our nature drives us towards monotheism because I live in a culture/hemisphere that has had a lot of contact with monotheism throughout history?

It was pretty much just one sun baked desert tribe that made the leap from "Our god is better than your god" to "Our god is perfect in ways we can't even describe. Your god just plain doesn't exist." The practice of telling people that their god(s) don't exist became extremely popular over the next couple millennia, to the point where people would seek out new territories on the off chance they could discover people and tell them their god(s) don't exist. Then said people got really good at sailing to new territories, and now the various empires of "Knock, knock, your god is fake" control most of Europe, Africa, the Americas, and dryer and colder parts of Asia.

The surviving major power bases of polytheism, pantheism, and functional atheism ("Gods are very real, but they play no part in salvation/enlightenment) are all in Asia. India traditionally hasn't been very evangelical, except for Buddhism. China recently went through a phase where it decided to disbelieve in gods, agriculture, and economics all at the same time, and it's taking some time for them and their neighbors to recover from the entirely predictable results of that.

Follow-up to add:
The new wave atheists who do nothing but go around telling people they're stupid for believing in g/God(s) can thus be thought of as the 4th Abrahamic religion, taking the seed idea of "{God} doesn't exist" from monotheism and extending it to its logical conclusion of no god existing.

Small a atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities.
Large A Atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities and that's the no-God's honest Truth.

Kai's Atheism: I hold no beliefs in deities, and discovered that there were more important things to care about after making that choice, namely the well being of other humans. And anyone who doesn't like my use of the word can wank off. That's the no-God's honest Truth.

You might consider saying something to the Atheists who like to bandy the word about as an umbrella that covers their bigotry. I'll explain why sometime. But not tonight, I have a pretty lady to meet for drinks.

I do. They don't like that very much. They like a strict dictionary definition, which is amoral and therefore allows them to be douchecanoes. This is contrary to the PZ Myers school of Atheism, which asks, "Okay, we're on board that there are no gods, now what?" and proceeds to be pretty much humanism from there on out. It's a huge fight right now, between the shitbags and people who want the shitbags to fuck off. I posted a link earlier in this thre...oh, I just realized: were you talking about people on here?

Well, I for one appreciate the hell out of the fact that you do.

I missed a lot of the earlier posts in this thread due to school eating my brain, and am not sure when I'll get to go through the whole thing.

And I was not consciously talking about people on here, although this thread tapped a chord for some people who did have experiences here.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Demolition Squid

Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on October 25, 2013, 03:45:12 AM
I went looking for the condom thing, and found this:



ENGLAND!  WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON OVER THERE?

Fathers 4 Justice, although they are guilty of the heinous crime of replace words with numbers for no reason, aren't the same assholes as 'mens rights activists'. They are campaigning for it to be easier for divorced fathers to get custody over their children, because they believe that being the mother does not automatically make you a better parent than the father. This is true! And the courts do sometimes recognize it. But there is a heavy bias against taking kids away from mom and only allowing her to visit on weekends.

AFAIK they are not about how men are being discriminated against in other areas. They were also some of the most fun protesters in recent years, as they climbed buildings dressed as superheroes and chilled up there with a giant banner to make their point.

I don't think they've been very active recently, though. I heard the League of Evil Mothers got hold of some kryptonite. Very sad.  :cry:
Vast and Roaring Nipplebeast from the Dawn of Soho

Nephew Twiddleton

Quote from: Demolition Squid on October 25, 2013, 07:51:51 AM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on October 25, 2013, 03:45:12 AM
I went looking for the condom thing, and found this:



ENGLAND!  WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON OVER THERE?

Fathers 4 Justice, although they are guilty of the heinous crime of replace words with numbers for no reason, aren't the same assholes as 'mens rights activists'. They are campaigning for it to be easier for divorced fathers to get custody over their children, because they believe that being the mother does not automatically make you a better parent than the father. This is true! And the courts do sometimes recognize it. But there is a heavy bias against taking kids away from mom and only allowing her to visit on weekends.

AFAIK they are not about how men are being discriminated against in other areas. They were also some of the most fun protesters in recent years, as they climbed buildings dressed as superheroes and chilled up there with a giant banner to make their point.

I don't think they've been very active recently, though. I heard the League of Evil Mothers got hold of some kryptonite. Very sad.  :cry:

If the League of Evil Mothers is not a legitimate organization, then I'm afraid we will have to counter-colonize and show you how life should be.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

Junkenstein

Roger, IIRC, the baby powder condom thing was thrown in parliament to make a point about what demosquid just mentioned.

There's little more to it than that as I think there was a little panic that it might have been filled with anthrax or ricin or teh gay or something. Everyone noted how absolutely unacceptable this behaviour was.

What's actually unacceptable is that he was able to smuggle it in that easily, and didn't use something that would have "refreshed our political process".
Nine naked Men just walking down the road will cause a heap of trouble for all concerned.

P3nT4gR4m

Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on October 24, 2013, 11:19:49 PM
Quote from: Aucoq on October 24, 2013, 11:03:22 PM
Somewhere out there P3nt is running around with a cigar in his mouth and a blonde on each arm, completely unaware of the havoc he has caused. :lol:

:lulz:

I have no hate for the man.  I just think his thinking is fractured.

Can't argue with that. My mind is such a clusterfuck of bad wiring that, most of the time, I just point blank refuse to use it for fear of electrocution  :)

I'm up to my arse in Brexit Numpties, but I want more.  Target-rich environments are the new sexy.
Not actually a meat product.
Ass-Kicking & Foot-Stomping Ancient Master of SHIT FUCK FUCK FUCK
Awful and Bent Behemothic Results of Last Night's Painful Squat.
High Altitude Haggis-Filled Sex Bucket From Beyond Time and Space.
Internet Monkey Person of Filthy and Immoral Pygmy-Porn Wart Contagion
Octomom Auxillary Heat Exchanger Repairman
walking the fine line line between genius and batshit fucking crazy

"computation is a pattern in the spacetime arrangement of particles, and it's not the particles but the pattern that really matters! Matter doesn't matter." -- Max Tegmark

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

I probably wouldn't have used an attention-getting opener in person, I would have said something like "It occurs to me that the Atheist community has a lot in common with the White Supremacist community" and then I would have explained why. And I would have explained that while the lack of belief in deity is not alone what I am talking about, but the identification with a group that seems increasingly to be engaging in aggressive us-vs-them posturing and tribalism. That while most atheists may not generate or pass around or chuckle at the commentary and imagery that is derogatory or outright hateful toward people who are not atheist, almost none speak out against it, either, and so it is in most cases tacitly condoned. I would have had a chance to explain, much like I did last night in a group of mostly atheistic friends, why these attitudes have driven me away in repugnance from identifying myself as an Atheist despite the fact that my perspective is, for all practical purposes, atheistic.

So, yeah, my opening line was hyperbole, just exactly as hyperbolic as most of my opening lines have been here over the last seven years. What I wasn't really expecting was for so many people to act like I stabbed their puppy. In retrospect I guess it's not that surprising, and it seems a lot of people did eventually come around to examining why I would make the comparison I made, but evidently it also engendered flat-out hatred in a few people, to a greater degree even than when I called everyone "White" (remember that shitstorm?) or talking about examining our privileges. Atheism, of all these things, was too sacred a cow to tilt at.

And yet, I look around me, and see images like this all over facebook:


OK. One such image isn't really anything more than a chuckle. But a brief tour of Atheist blogs, forums, websites and it's not one image, it's a deluge of images and sentiments like this:

QuoteIf you throw your lot in with the religious, then you've stated that you think we're wrong, and that whatever nice things you say are essentially a load of condescending BS and that you're merely tolerating us. And since that is the case, you're a fucking tool, a coward, unable to think for yourself, running on the same fuck-begotten treadmill of bullshit that billions of other tools just like you run on, bleating your little sheep bleat as you blindly gulp down and swallow whatever jizz-load of bullshit your religious overlords blow in your mouth! So go fuck yourself!

THIS IS MILITANT ATHEISM, PEOPLE! BEING LOUD, ANGRY, AND AGGRESSIVE IS THE ONLY FUCKING THING PEOPLE UNDERSTAND! HISTORY'S SHOWN IT THOUSANDS OF FUCKING TIMES! OUR MODERN AGE CONTINUES TO SHOW IT EVERY FUCKING DAY OF OUR LIVES!

So yeah, next time one of you religious TWITS is whining about how atheists are "shoving nothing in your face," CAN IT, YOU LITTLE PUSSIES. We've been nice all these years, we've gotten nothing in exchange! You're upset that suddenly we're being loud, and we're being assholes?!

(same guy, earlier, claimed that Atheists are the "most hated minority".)

So what I'm talking about is the same ook-ook, us-against-them monkey-assed tribal warfare bullshit that I was under the impression most of us here are trying to shine a light on to encourage better behavior. Common walls?

Take a look if you don't believe me. It's not only out there, but it's a raging current of bullshit and it goes largely unchallenged. And despite what the proponents say, the ones who believe themselves to be the great suffering minority struggling for freedom and equality, their actions are not helping. They are harming. They are increasing a divide that needs to be decreased.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."