(January 27, 2016 at 11:45 am)Drich Wrote: Pop morality is a term I use to describe what the popular culture deems moral. Pop morality is an ever changing standard. It's what is popularly defined as right and wrong, here in this country/your country, and now/current generation, could easily be held as Immoral a generation ago or perhaps even in a future generation. This is also true even in this current generation, but perhaps in a different region or country. because this ever changing standard is unique to a specific time and place to a specific people I use the term pop morality.

Homosexuality and Abortion are two good examples of how pop morality has changed it's 'values' concerning these two subjects. Just one or two generations ago these two social issues were THE most Immoral thing one could do in this society. Now the most immoral thing one can do is try and prevent someone from being gay or having an abortion.

The problem with pop morality is, that every generation and ever culture thinks that they are good and are doing the 'right thing.' but again the 'right thing' varies wildly from region to region/generation to generation. Self righteousness kicks in, and someone makes a judgment. (look at the last epicurean paradox thread for the typical atheist 'judgement.')

Now that said, without any absolute standards, what makes any of you think that your current acceptance of pop morality as being 'the good and right thing' makes you any different than those who have accepted the pop morality of their time and or culture? Meaning if you have no absolutes standards in your life (like the bible,) and if you were born into Hitler's Germany, under North Korean rule or maybe under an ISIS state, and just like you do now, you blindly follow and do not challenge pop morality of your culture, how then would you find your way back to what you now consider to be 'moral'?

Or do you agree that your current sense of 'morality' is trivial? If so, why try and judge God by it? Why assume that living a simply 'moral' life is enough for anything? What makes your version of 'morality' any better than anyone else's? Are you all so foolish to think that the people who live their versions of 'moral' lives think themselves as evil, even if it means killing you and people like you?

Look at us now. We think it right to kill terrorists, we do not see ourselves as being evil for killing someone who would disrupt our lives in such away.. and yet somehow it's wrong when they do the same thing? Again the point being they do what they do (shoot up magazines and cut of heads) in the name of what they think is right. Just like we do.

So my question is, if you have a heart that blindly accepts everything society tells you is 'moral'/You justify your morality by using common/pop arguments, and you have no system of checks and balances outside of what society defines as 'moral' how then are you any different than dark age Christians, North Koreans, ISIS, Taliban, Nazis, the US slave traders/owners, The US citizens who supported the wholesale slaughter of the Indians Etc??

All of these people followed their 'pop morality' to it's logical end. How is the modern westerner any different? What about your system of belief transcends what other generations will deem 'immoral?' and if you do not have this absolute morality, then how are you in a position to judge ANYONE Else's system of right and wrong?

Fuck you

(March 11, 2016 at 5:28 pm)Thena323 Wrote: You know good and well that I was simply responding to ONE of the many countless, exaggerated, and uninformed claims that you make on any given day.... And yes, I believe understand your overarching theme:

You believe that popular morality dictates human behavior and poses an ever-present danger of society being manipulated down a slippery slope of depravity and evil. You believe that the determining one's own morality (if that were possible) would present no less of a danger, as it stems from self-righteousness.

You believe that that Something Else is required: That an unchanging, objective morality, based on strict adherence to the rules specifically set by the God of the Bible, is the only morality capable of preventing inevitable societal free-fall into total moral decay and/or apathy...Or something like that, right?

Ah!! There in lies the problem. You think I am suggesting we exchange one set of principles for another.
I'm not. Nothing could be further from the truth.

What I am saying is we need an unchanging standard, so that we can always Identify sin/Know wrong, so then we always have the option to repent of it, and find redemption. What self righteousness does, is lower the bar so rather than push one to repentance.. we look to justify sin rather than turn from it.

Strict adherence is not the key. repentance is, we can't/won't ever repent if we feel justified in sin. If we learn to repent we will also learn to find the freedom from the 'strict adherence of the law' that "moral people" have to have inorder to maintain their 'morality.' This 'strict adherence that bind moral people to the law (and subsequently why they tend to be constantly changing the law to fit their sinful appetites) is the total opposite of what Christ offers. Christ is offering righteousness Despite one's sins not because of our perceived 'righteousness.'

Quote:I'm telling you that there is no Something Else, as far I'm concerned. Your position is dependent on the presupposition that your God actually exists. You know that I, as the majority of users here, do not believe that to be true. As I see it, the Bible contains the same variety of shitty morality you've been railing against this entire thread. There are no books with special properties and there is no Cavalry coming. 
The morality of mere mortals is all there is.

We  try our best, and hope we get it right.
Sucks, I know. 

Nothing to be done about that, though.

I've talked to a lot of 'Atheist' and what I found is that most can't believe in God, because they've tested the mold/perception they think God comes in and their idea of God failed. Or better yet if they 'kill the idea of God' then they do not have to live the strict adherence of Life, they think is necessary to be a follower of God. The problem with both types of 'atheist' is that their judgement of God both depend on God fitting in this tiny little box in their perceived/limited understanding. Very few if any of you has considered that God may exist outside the confines of what you understand to be God, or What it means to be Holy. You need God to be a tyrant in order to live in your perceived "freedoms."

What if you are wrong and have it completely backwards? What if your perception of "freedom" are indeed chains, and what you think God is chaining you to is actually true freedom?

If you are tied to society to define 'righteousness/self righteousness' then you are chained to society and it's version of right and wrong to validate yourself. Which as we've discussed if society makes a hard left into evil as the Nazi's did, then you must also follow, otherwise you risk being judged 'immoral or a bigot' by society.

Let's take infanticide/Abortion. Now is it possible to stand against or tell someone they can't get an abortion, from the societal POV? Could you defend the unborn, as you would if that same child was born? Even against his/her own mother?

In society no, you'd be put in Jail if you took the same measures against a unborn child's mother, that you would have the right to do/defend that same child, against that same mother if he were in fact born. So again the societal limitation forces you to accept what has been deemed 'right' and does not allow you to act against what society has deems ok.. Meaning you are forced to accept what soceity says is right or pay the penality for being 'Immoral.'

Now turn that around. The command is we are not to murder. This includes Children/babies. Now can a woman have an abortion and still be found righteous? Yes of course she can if she repents. Can she be found righteous if she carries the baby to term, Yes! Can she be found righteous if she feels compelled to defend an unborn child from a mother trying to kill her baby? Yes she can. Can she be found righteous if she decides not to? Again yes!
Is their anything a woman can't do for or against a baby and loose her righteousness before God, Even Sin if she were to simply repent?

No Because her/our righteousness is not tied to our actions or inaction. Our righteousness is a gift one we do not deserve, and can not earn. We can only refuse or accept it.

(Which is why I do not understand you people and your refusal.)

To you which person is truly free, and which is not? The person who is forced to think and act a certain way to define their 'morality?' by society's rules? or the person who Righteousness is not tied to the Law, but to the Righteousness of Christ by the atonement He offers?

Again the Law is to show us where sin is in our lives. It is not meant as a measure to live by. It is meant to point us to repentance, and we can not repent if we do not accept our sin/Have an absolute standard to live by.

Morality is the opposite. justifies sin which leads to unrepentance. Which is why we need that absolute standard. Not to force strict adherence, but to identify and repent of sin. With this also comes the added bonus ofnot defining our 'morality' by what society says do or do not do..

(March 11, 2016 at 6:08 pm)Mancunian Wrote:

(January 27, 2016 at 11:45 am)Drich Wrote: Pop morality is a term I use to describe what the popular culture deems moral. Pop morality is an ever changing standard. It's what is popularly defined as right and wrong, here in this country/your country, and now/current generation, could easily be held as Immoral a generation ago or perhaps even in a future generation. This is also true even in this current generation, but perhaps in a different region or country. because this ever changing standard is unique to a specific time and place to a specific people I use the term pop morality.

Homosexuality and Abortion are two good examples of how pop morality has changed it's 'values' concerning these two subjects. Just one or two generations ago these two social issues were THE most Immoral thing one could do in this society. Now the most immoral thing one can do is try and prevent someone from being gay or having an abortion.

The problem with pop morality is, that every generation and ever culture thinks that they are good and are doing the 'right thing.' but again the 'right thing' varies wildly from region to region/generation to generation. Self righteousness kicks in, and someone makes a judgment. (look at the last epicurean paradox thread for the typical atheist 'judgement.')

Now that said, without any absolute standards, what makes any of you think that your current acceptance of pop morality as being 'the good and right thing' makes you any different than those who have accepted the pop morality of their time and or culture? Meaning if you have no absolutes standards in your life (like the bible,) and if you were born into Hitler's Germany, under North Korean rule or maybe under an ISIS state, and just like you do now, you blindly follow and do not challenge pop morality of your culture, how then would you find your way back to what you now consider to be 'moral'?

Or do you agree that your current sense of 'morality' is trivial? If so, why try and judge God by it? Why assume that living a simply 'moral' life is enough for anything? What makes your version of 'morality' any better than anyone else's? Are you all so foolish to think that the people who live their versions of 'moral' lives think themselves as evil, even if it means killing you and people like you?

Look at us now. We think it right to kill terrorists, we do not see ourselves as being evil for killing someone who would disrupt our lives in such away.. and yet somehow it's wrong when they do the same thing? Again the point being they do what they do (shoot up magazines and cut of heads) in the name of what they think is right. Just like we do.

So my question is, if you have a heart that blindly accepts everything society tells you is 'moral'/You justify your morality by using common/pop arguments, and you have no system of checks and balances outside of what society defines as 'moral' how then are you any different than dark age Christians, North Koreans, ISIS, Taliban, Nazis, the US slave traders/owners, The US citizens who supported the wholesale slaughter of the Indians Etc??

All of these people followed their 'pop morality' to it's logical end. How is the modern westerner any different? What about your system of belief transcends what other generations will deem 'immoral?' and if you do not have this absolute morality, then how are you in a position to judge ANYONE Else's system of right and wrong?

Fuck you

You butt hurt or just a deep/great atheist "thinker?"

(March 14, 2016 at 3:48 pm)Drich Wrote:

(March 11, 2016 at 5:28 pm)Thena323 Wrote:

---

You know good and well that I was simply responding to ONE of the many countless, exaggerated, and uninformed claims that you make on any given day.... And yes, I believe understand your overarching theme:

You believe that popular morality dictates human behavior and poses an ever-present danger of society being manipulated down a slippery slope of depravity and evil. You believe that the determining one's own morality (if that were possible) would present no less of a danger, as it stems from self-righteousness.

You believe that that Something Else is required: That an unchanging, objective morality, based on strict adherence to the rules specifically set by the God of the Bible, is the only morality capable of preventing inevitable societal free-fall into total moral decay and/or apathy...Or something like that, right?

---

---

 Ah!! There in lies the problem. You think I am suggesting we exchange one set of principles for another.
I'm not. Nothing could be further from the truth.

What I am saying is we need an unchanging standard, so that we can always Identify sin/Know wrong, so then we always have the option to repent of it, and find redemption. What self righteousness does, is lower the bar so rather than push one to repentance.. we look to justify sin rather than turn from it.

Strict adherence is not the key. repentance is, we can't/won't ever repent if we feel justified in sin. If we learn to repent we will also learn to find the freedom from the 'strict adherence of the law' that "moral people" have to have inorder to maintain their 'morality.' This 'strict adherence that bind moral people to the law (and subsequently why they tend to be constantly changing the law to fit their sinful appetites) is the total opposite of what Christ offers. Christ is offering righteousness Despite one's sins not because of our perceived 'righteousness.'

---

Quote:

---

 I'm telling you that there is no Something Else, as far I'm concerned.

---

Quote: Your position is dependent on the presupposition that your God actually exists. You know that I, as the majority of users here, do not believe that to be true. As I see it, the Bible contains the same variety of shitty morality you've been railing against this entire thread. There are no books with special properties and there is no Cavalry coming. 
The morality of mere mortals is all there is.

 

---

We  try our best, and hope we get it right.
Sucks, I know. 

Nothing to be done about that, though.

---

---

I've talked to a lot of 'Atheist' and what I found is that most can't believe in God, because they've tested the mold/perception they think God comes in and their idea of God failed. Or better yet if they 'kill the idea of God' then they do not have to live the strict adherence of Life, they think is necessary to be a follower of God. The problem with both types of 'atheist' is that their judgement of God both depend on God fitting in this tiny little box in their perceived/limited understanding. Very few if any of you has considered that God may exist outside the confines of what you understand to be God, or What it means to be Holy. You need God to be a tyrant in order to live in your perceived "freedoms."

What if you are wrong and have it completely backwards? What if your perception of "freedom" are indeed chains, and what you think God is chaining you to is actually true freedom?

If you are tied to society to define 'righteousness/self righteousness' then you are chained to society and it's version of right and wrong to validate yourself. Which as we've discussed if society makes a hard left into evil as the Nazi's did, then you must also follow, otherwise you risk being judged 'immoral or a bigot' by society.

Let's take infanticide/Abortion. Now is it possible to stand against or tell someone they can't get an abortion, from the societal POV? Could you defend the unborn, as you would if that same child was born? Even against his/her own mother?

In society no, you'd be put in Jail if you took the same measures against a unborn child's mother, that you would have the right to do/defend that same child, against that same mother if he were in fact born. So again the societal limitation forces you to accept what has been deemed 'right' and does not allow you to act against what society has deems ok.. Meaning you are forced to accept what soceity says is right or pay the penality for being 'Immoral.'

Now turn that around. The command is we are not to murder. This includes Children/babies. Now can a woman have an abortion and still be found righteous? Yes of course she can if she repents. Can she be found righteous if she carries the baby to term, Yes! Can she be found righteous if she feels compelled to defend an unborn child from a mother trying to kill her baby? Yes she can. Can she be found righteous if she decides not to? Again yes!
Is their anything a woman can't do for or against a baby and loose her righteousness before God, Even Sin if she were to simply repent?

No Because her/our righteousness is not tied to our actions or inaction. Our righteousness is a gift one we do not deserve, and can not earn. We can only refuse or accept it.

---

(Which is why I do not understand you people and your refusal.)

---

To you which person is truly free, and which is not? The person who is forced to think and act a certain way to define their 'morality?' by society's rules? or the person who Righteousness is not tied to the Law, but to the Righteousness of Christ by the atonement He offers?

Again the Law is to show us where sin is in our lives. It is not meant as a measure to live by. It is meant to point us to repentance, and we can not repent if we do not accept our sin/Have an absolute standard to live by.

Morality is the opposite. justifies sin which leads to unrepentance. Which is why we need that absolute standard. Not to force strict adherence, but to identify and repent of sin. With this also comes the added bonus ofnot defining our 'morality' by what society says do or do not do..

---

It's very easy to understand "you people and your refusal".  God doesn't exist, and your wholly babble is a hideously evil and amoral example of badly-written mythology. Morality is a function of empathy, which most fundamentalist xtians lack in spades.  That's why the highest crime rates on the planet are found in areas that have xtian churches on every corner.  Read Elicka Peterson Sparks' recent study, "The Devil You Know".  It's quite engaging.

(March 14, 2016 at 3:57 pm)drfuzzy Wrote:

(March 14, 2016 at 3:48 pm)Drich Wrote:

---

 Ah!! There in lies the problem. You think I am suggesting we exchange one set of principles for another.
I'm not. Nothing could be further from the truth.

What I am saying is we need an unchanging standard, so that we can always Identify sin/Know wrong, so then we always have the option to repent of it, and find redemption. What self righteousness does, is lower the bar so rather than push one to repentance.. we look to justify sin rather than turn from it.

Strict adherence is not the key. repentance is, we can't/won't ever repent if we feel justified in sin. If we learn to repent we will also learn to find the freedom from the 'strict adherence of the law' that "moral people" have to have inorder to maintain their 'morality.' This 'strict adherence that bind moral people to the law (and subsequently why they tend to be constantly changing the law to fit their sinful appetites) is the total opposite of what Christ offers. Christ is offering righteousness Despite one's sins not because of our perceived 'righteousness.'

---

---

I've talked to a lot of 'Atheist' and what I found is that most can't believe in God, because they've tested the mold/perception they think God comes in and their idea of God failed. Or better yet if they 'kill the idea of God' then they do not have to live the strict adherence of Life, they think is necessary to be a follower of God. The problem with both types of 'atheist' is that their judgement of God both depend on God fitting in this tiny little box in their perceived/limited understanding. Very few if any of you has considered that God may exist outside the confines of what you understand to be God, or What it means to be Holy. You need God to be a tyrant in order to live in your perceived "freedoms."

What if you are wrong and have it completely backwards? What if your perception of "freedom" are indeed chains, and what you think God is chaining you to is actually true freedom?

If you are tied to society to define 'righteousness/self righteousness' then you are chained to society and it's version of right and wrong to validate yourself. Which as we've discussed if society makes a hard left into evil as the Nazi's did, then you must also follow, otherwise you risk being judged 'immoral or a bigot' by society.

Let's take infanticide/Abortion. Now is it possible to stand against or tell someone they can't get an abortion, from the societal POV? Could you defend the unborn, as you would if that same child was born? Even against his/her own mother?

In society no, you'd be put in Jail if you took the same measures against a unborn child's mother, that you would have the right to do/defend that same child, against that same mother if he were in fact born. So again the societal limitation forces you to accept what has been deemed 'right' and does not allow you to act against what society has deems ok.. Meaning you are forced to accept what soceity says is right or pay the penality for being 'Immoral.'

Now turn that around. The command is we are not to murder. This includes Children/babies. Now can a woman have an abortion and still be found righteous? Yes of course she can if she repents. Can she be found righteous if she carries the baby to term, Yes! Can she be found righteous if she feels compelled to defend an unborn child from a mother trying to kill her baby? Yes she can. Can she be found righteous if she decides not to? Again yes!
Is their anything a woman can't do for or against a baby and loose her righteousness before God, Even Sin if she were to simply repent?

No Because her/our righteousness is not tied to our actions or inaction. Our righteousness is a gift one we do not deserve, and can not earn. We can only refuse or accept it.

---

(Which is why I do not understand you people and your refusal.)

---

To you which person is truly free, and which is not? The person who is forced to think and act a certain way to define their 'morality?' by society's rules? or the person who Righteousness is not tied to the Law, but to the Righteousness of Christ by the atonement He offers?

Again the Law is to show us where sin is in our lives. It is not meant as a measure to live by. It is meant to point us to repentance, and we can not repent if we do not accept our sin/Have an absolute standard to live by.

Morality is the opposite. justifies sin which leads to unrepentance. Which is why we need that absolute standard. Not to force strict adherence, but to identify and repent of sin. With this also comes the added bonus ofnot defining our 'morality' by what society says do or do not do..

---

It's very easy to understand "you people and your refusal".  God doesn't exist, and your wholly babble is a hideously evil and amoral example of badly-written mythology. Morality is a function of empathy, which most fundamentalist xtians lack in spades.  That's why the highest crime rates on the planet are found in areas that have xtian churches on every corner.  Read Elicka Peterson Sparks' recent study, "The Devil You Know".  It's quite engaging.

didn't you people loose the 'empathy' argument on page 2? In that empathy can be manipulated and can be trained in society to be felt for some and to exclude others.

This Happened with the American Indians, Slaves, The Jews in Germany, Aborted Babies etc... All Human, but all had their humanity taken from them and so too was all empathy, which made it moral to kill them in the most inhumane way.

Science can never tell you what is moral, and what isn't. It can give you more and more accurate information, from which to decide for yourself. It saves you from making a massive blunder by accidentally doing something harmful through ignorance.

Man, I gotta cover this in a video. I keep seeing this silly idea that science can dictate morals. Only a complete loony would get their morals "from science". It doesn't make any sense.

(March 15, 2016 at 8:50 am)Drich Wrote:

(March 14, 2016 at 3:57 pm)drfuzzy Wrote: It's very easy to understand "you people and your refusal".  God doesn't exist, and your wholly babble is a hideously evil and amoral example of badly-written mythology. Morality is a function of empathy, which most fundamentalist xtians lack in spades.  That's why the highest crime rates on the planet are found in areas that have xtian churches on every corner.  Read Elicka Peterson Sparks' recent study, "The Devil You Know".  It's quite engaging.

didn't you people loose the 'empathy' argument on page 2? In that empathy can be manipulated and can be trained in society to be felt for some and to exclude others.

This Happened with the American Indians, Slaves, The Jews in Germany, Aborted Babies etc... All Human, but all had their humanity taken from them and so too was all empathy, which made it moral to kill them in the most inhumane way.

I'm trying to figure out why you think the ability of human tribalism to erode our sense of empathy when a group is designated an "outsider" group (i.e. "Them", not "Us") is a winning argument against moral codes being universally subjective and based on empathy.

Far from being the cause of it, being taught not to follow a Great Leader's teaching about some sort of overriding "objective moral code" seems to me to be an inoculation against the sort of propaganda of which you speak. If people are already conditioned to listen to outside social/moral code programming more than they listen to their own hearts, you get 1930s-40s Germany. That's true whether we're discussing religious programming or nationalist programming.

When you say that moral behavior cannot exist without some "Overseer" telling us what to do, it tells us that you Christians (and anyone else who thinks that way) are sociopaths, incapable of doing the right thing on behalf of your fellow human beings just because it's the kind and feeling thing to do. 

Ironically, even Jesus enumerated the "Golden Rule" concept, an empathy-based moral outlook... "if it would suck for you, it would probably suck for them, so don't do it to them either".

Post 652 will help you 'figure things out if you haven't already read it.

(March 16, 2016 at 11:13 am)Drich Wrote: Post 652 will help you 'figure things out if you haven't already read it.

Yes, I read that drivel. It's the same bullshit about atheists on which we've corrected you numerous times. It's absolutely astounding to me that you keep repeating the same drivel despite such corrections. You're either learning-disabled or just too dismissive of our shared humanity to actually listen to us.

And, when you previously posted that same horse-hockey about homosexuality being such a bad thing in our society, I pointed you to the finding of the US Supreme Court, where they noted that the active repression of homosexual behavior is NOT "deeply rooted in American society and tradition", but a fairly recent phenomenon. Of course, homosexual people often were murdered by Christians in the name of Gawd (thus the term "faggot", a bundle of sticks, to remind them that the could be burned alive), but I hardly count that as any sort of moral behavior. 

As for abortion, I challenge you to find a mention of it outside proto-feminist literature, pre-1940. It, too, was not something that was considered morally reprobate on the level you're describing. These have become causes celebre only in relatively recent times.

What you are really whining about is not the loss of morality but the loss of Christian privilege, in which your cult once had the power to (locally, and occasionally via legislation) push its wacko religious ideologies onto others, and now you lament that atheists can freely speak out about not accepting your bullshit, and you can't oppress us for it or continue to use government money/power to promote your cult's message.

Finally, and most importantly, your post #652 doesn't even remotely address what I raised, namely the fact that human empathy is a better marker for the treatment of one another than any ideology-- every one of the historical examples you named in that list, as-always trying to tie us to Hitler per your usual fascination, is an ideology that was able to override our natural human empathy and play upon our tribalism and xenophobia in order to turn some out-group into The Dangerous Other™ who needed to be stopped/destroyed. Christianity most certainly belongs on that list of ideologies capable of overriding our human empathy, as do Nazi Fascism and Marxist "we claim to be communist but aren't really" dictatorships.

In other words, you've won the argument for us by acknowledging that human empathy-based morality is the standard, the standard from which we must be corrupted by ideology in order to sink to the levels of depravity you described. You simply think that your Christian ideology is The Only Right One™ out of the many, despite the reams of evidence that it causes people to do harm as a result of that corruption. To us, you're just one out of the many ideologies against which skeptical thinking may inoculate people before they fall victim to such ideologies that can dehumanize others and remove us from our empathy-based morality.

As I said before, your Jesus guy figured it out... even if he was just paraphrasing the Golden Rule from others who figured it out before him.

(March 16, 2016 at 12:54 pm)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote:

(March 16, 2016 at 11:13 am)Drich Wrote: Post 652 will help you 'figure things out if you haven't already read it.

Yes, I read that drivel. It's the same bullshit about atheists on which we've corrected you numerous times. It's absolutely astounding to me that you keep repeating the same drivel despite such corrections. You're either learning-disabled or just too dismissive of our shared humanity to actually listen to us.

And, when you previously posted that same horse-hockey about homosexuality being such a bad thing in our society, I pointed you to the finding of the US Supreme Court, where they noted that the active repression of homosexual behavior is NOT "deeply rooted in American society and tradition", but a fairly recent phenomenon. Of course, homosexual people often were murdered by Christians in the name of Gawd (thus the term "faggot", a bundle of sticks, to remind them that the could be burned alive), but I hardly count that as any sort of moral behavior. 

As for abortion, I challenge you to find a mention of it outside proto-feminist literature, pre-1940. It, too, was not something that was considered morally reprobate on the level you're describing. These have become causes celebre only in relatively recent times.

What you are really whining about is not the loss of morality but the loss of Christian privilege, in which your cult once had the power to (locally, and occasionally via legislation) push its wacko religious ideologies onto others, and now you lament that atheists can freely speak out about not accepting your bullshit, and you can't oppress us for it or continue to use government money/power to promote your cult's message.

Finally, and most importantly, your post #652 doesn't even remotely address what I raised, namely the fact that human empathy is a better marker for the treatment of one another than any ideology-- every one of the historical examples you named in that list, as-always trying to tie us to Hitler per your usual fascination, is an ideology that was able to override our natural human empathy and play upon our tribalism and xenophobia in order to turn some out-group into The Dangerous Other™ who needed to be stopped/destroyed. Christianity most certainly belongs on that list of ideologies capable of overriding our human empathy, as do Nazi Fascism and Marxist "we claim to be communist but aren't really" dictatorships.

In other words, you've won the argument for us by acknowledging that human empathy-based morality is the standard, the standard from which we must be corrupted by ideology in order to sink to the levels of depravity you described. You simply think that your Christian ideology is The Only Right One™ out of the many, despite the reams of evidence that it causes people to do harm as a result of that corruption. To us, you're just one out of the many ideologies against which skeptical thinking may inoculate people before they fall victim to such ideologies that can dehumanize others and remove us from our empathy-based morality.

As I said before, your Jesus guy figured it out... even if he was just paraphrasing the Golden Rule from others who figured it out before him.

Oh glob..

I thought you were one of the 'smart ones.' You can seriously be reading my posts and still retain such a large content diffency unless you are just scanning for keywords to build a strawman/what you think I am trying to argue from just a quick skim read.

So let me explain my first paragraph which is what in post 652 that renders your whole last post and the one before it completely moot.

Please take time to read this again:
Ah!! There in lies the problem. You think I am suggesting we exchange one set of principles for another.

I'm not. Nothing could be further from the truth.

What I am saying is we need an unchanging standard, so that we can always Identify sin/Know wrong, so then we always have the option to repent of it, and find redemption. What self righteousness does, is lower the bar so rather than push one to repentance.. we look to justify sin rather than turn from it.

Strict adherence is not the key. repentance is, we can't/won't ever repent if we feel justified in sin. If we learn to repent we will also learn to find the freedom from the 'strict adherence of the law' that "moral people" have to have inorder to maintain their 'morality.' This 'strict adherence that bind moral people to the law (and subsequently why they tend to be constantly changing the law to fit their sinful appetites) is the total opposite of what Christ offers. Christ is offering righteousness Despite one's sins not because of our perceived 'righteousness.'

You last two posts just like all the posts of Thena Are under the assumption that I am trying to push Christian 'morals' over pop morality/empathy based morals.

Understand 'smart guy' I'm not. As you pointed out All morals are corrupt, unchecked 'christian morals' are what incited the Dark ages, witch burnings, the inquisition, whatever you said about 'fags.' All the 'bad stuff' is a direct result of taking 1/2 of what God has done and then trying to make it fit a 'moral' standard of living.

What I am saying is all 'morality' is bad, no matter who sponcers it or how it is founded. because all 'morality' is based on a righteousness (in this case a gold standard of good) other than God's. God's standard of righteousness can be found in his completed law. All of the Law of the OT, along with the extension of the law Jesus himself added to include thought. Which is Impossible for any of us to follow. Which is why God provided atonement. atonement allows us grace from the sins we being slaves to sin can not help but to commit. The only catch being we have to repent, before we can accept atonement that gives us grace/freedom from the law.

However we can not repent if our 'morality' says it is ok to commit certain sins. That is the only reason we need God's standard. so we know when to repent/turn from our sin. It is not meant for us to try and live by to define our 'morality/worthiness' for heaven. God's law is only to show our sin. So again we can repent of it and be free from trying to live a 'moral' life. meaning a life defined by our actions.

So you see while you are busy trying to define who you are by how you live your life/what deed your 'morality' tells you to do or not do. A Christian's 'righteousness' is found completely separate and apart from the things he does or does not do. My 'righteousness' is defined by the life Christ lived, not the one I live. for I put on his 'morality/righteousness' and die to my own when I accepted the atonement He offered me.. That means I am free from the laws of man and God as a means to define my own righteousness.

So again you whole argument is moot as I am not trying to replace one morality with another as you seem to think. I am trying to free you from following any version of morality to define who you are before God.