(August 12, 2016 at 3:37 pm)Lek Wrote: As far as American republicans, you don't know most of them, but only how the media portrays them.  If we knew each other I think we could come together far more often.

Rather how the prominent ones portray themselves, what bills they bring forward and what bills they try to prevent and oppose. You're right, I don't know most of them. But if these are public representatives being elected, it's a fair guess their electorate ticks in similar ways.

Which, again, paints a rather ugly picture, as far as religion is concerned.

(August 12, 2015 at 12:51 pm)abaris Wrote: Wow, that's simplistic to use a friendly word - and only based on some select quotes. For starters it doesn't take into account how the party changed over the years. The program has been written in 1920. It also doesn't take into account how figures like Rosenberg, Himmler and Hitler himself defined themselves.

I take offense with that kind of simplistic views, since it's as stupid as theists saying that Communism was an atheist movement.

Well, this also cuts to the core as to gross generalizations when dealing with the climate of the Middle East in modern times. Any empathetic human should rightfully condemn the acts of Hitler. And while some westernized Muslims and liberals who support pluralism, can be over protective to the point of calling all criticism falsely as bigotry, I still warn people that taking a Trump demagoguery approach to dealing with Islam is a s bad as what Germany did with Jews in WW2. I have conversed with many over the years from the East who do want that part of the world to get with the modern west. It still remains for me, protecting the ability to blaspheme any  religion worldwide, and any world leader, should never rise to the collective political level of scapegoating as we saw from  Hitler and unfortunately from Trump. The only upside is that we still live in the west where we can condemn such political demagoguery.

There is a huge difference between blasphemy and political demagoguery. There is a huge difference between offending a bad claim or bad idea, and demonizing on a blanket level as a solution. There is lots to be criticized and blasphemed in Islam, sure, but it is the same group think and blind loyalty that leads their fundies to the point of violence that Hitler successfully sold to lead to the murder of 6 million Jews as well as 50 million lives worldwide by the end of the world. I still refuse while going after bad claims, to use carpet assumptions of guilt of individuals I have never met. Claims do not deserve to be scrutiny free or blasphemy free, but humans are still just that, and are individuals to me first.

(August 12, 2015 at 8:52 pm)Dystopia Wrote: I'll keep my controversial stance - Nazism is, by it's very nature, profoundly anti-religious because you can only strongly worship and obey one being at a time.

Replacing one type of god with another is not the definition of anti-religious. If that were the case, christianity is anti-religion and so is islam.

(August 12, 2016 at 12:42 pm)Lek Wrote: i haven't read all 210 replies, but if all Nazis claimed to be catholic or christian, they certainly didn't follow christian teachings and morality.  They were obviously not followers of Christ, which is what "christian" means.

Ah, the No True Scotsman fallacy.

(August 12, 2016 at 12:42 pm)Lek Wrote: i haven't read all 210 replies, but if all Nazis claimed to be catholic or christian, they certainly didn't follow christian teachings and morality.  They were obviously not followers of Christ, which is what "christian" means.

Nope sorry, doesn't work like that. How you would prefer someone else interpret the bible does not mean they don't view it as their source of morality like you do. Not liking their interpretation does not make it a different source. The German Christian population at the time of Hitler WERE a majority Christian. Just like one can accept in the west that a Sunni Muslim and Shiite Muslim both see the Quran as their source of morality.

I have seen the "True Scotsman" fallacy used by even Jews and Buddhists. "They weren't following it right" is a dodge. If there were only one way to follow any religion we would not see sub sects in any and all have their competing sub sects. A Chinese Buddhist does not view the religion the same as a Tibet Buddhist vs a Japanese Buddhist. 

There has never been such a thing as a perfectly unified religion, or "correct" following of any. That is because all religions are human inventions that are really nothing more than artificial constructs in attempts to create social order. 

Not even the word "atheist" makes us perfectly unified. Our species morality  is evolutionary, both in our ability to be cruel or compassionate, to cooperate or use force. Humans evolved to be social and that is the real reason we form groups. There has never been a magic man in the sky pulling our strings, not even a mere mortal, as some would claim the original Buddha to be, which is also a religion rooted in mythology and superstition. 

Our species was around long before any written religion or first boarders. Our planet is 4 billion years old, revolving around 1 star, our sun in a galaxy full of billions of stars. A galaxy so big it takes 1 ray of light 100,000 years at the speed of light to cross. Our galaxy is also only one of hundred of billions in our observable universe.  Religion is only as good as far as a placebo effect at best, but throughout history has caused great amounts of divisions and death. Religion was our species early form of guessing at what was, but we have much better tools now to measure the universe outside our own personal wishes.

The theist likes to falsely portray the atheist as fatalistic and negative and immoral. Now while the word itself doesn't determine the individual atheists actions good or bad throughout their lives, we are not a separate species from theists. We can be good and do good, we have ups and downs like everyone else, some individuals can do bad, but most simply want the same securities and order most humans want. The only difference between an atheist and a theist is that we reject one more God claim and religious club than the theist does. We simply don't assign good or bad to a battle between a super hero and super villain battling  over the neurons in your brain.

(August 13, 2016 at 2:00 pm)Gawdzilla Sama Wrote:

(August 12, 2016 at 12:42 pm)Lek Wrote: i haven't read all 210 replies, but if all Nazis claimed to be catholic or christian, they certainly didn't follow christian teachings and morality.  They were obviously not followers of Christ, which is what "christian" means.

Ah, the No True Scotsman fallacy.

Not necessarily if Lek can make a case that Nazi ideology is fundamentally incompatible with what he considers the Christian message, no?

(August 13, 2016 at 4:33 pm)Alex K Wrote: Not necessarily if Lek can make a case that Nazi ideology is fundamentally incompatible with what he considers the Christian message, no?

But he can't do that. Because of the christian ideologies being prevalent in America. Which range from the KKK over the rightwing Republican exponents to end at rather liberal interpretations such as displayed by Kingpin here.

Some are more, some are less compatible with nazi ideology and social Darwinism. And I stress again, the nazi movement wasn't a christian movement. It just contained certain christians without deterring them. Even pope Pius XII showed sympathies for the nazis as well as the (according to some historians) even more abhorrent croatian fascists.

It's amazing this thread is still going.

(August 13, 2016 at 4:33 pm)Alex K Wrote:

(August 13, 2016 at 2:00 pm)Gawdzilla Sama Wrote: Ah, the No True Scotsman fallacy.

Not necessarily if Lek can make a case that Nazi ideology is fundamentally incompatible with what he considers the Christian message, no?

No it never works regardless. 

What humans are really saying when they point to a book or religious club is trying to say "I am a good person", which may be the case sure, but it isn't the book doing it, it is merely the false perception that our species morality is coming from it, which it is not. There simply is no "right way" to interpret any holy book, or follow any holy leader. 

If one can accept there are good people outside one's own label, then that should tell everyone, that it is our species either fostering cooperation and non violence rather than it coming from ancient religion itself. 

Christianity is merely currently perceived in the west as more civil, but it wasn't that long ago, even in our own history where it was spread by force and when slavery existed. I hate the false attempts for them to try to have it both ways. The Jesus of the bible is still under the same God character described from the first page to the last page in the bible. That character starts out scapegoating his own creation, then uses threats and violence to keep his followers in line and his words are used by his followers to justify harm to non Hebrew tribes. But only a very weak attempt to downplay all that with the "I am not the wife beater God I used to be in the OT, is negated by this same God along with Jesus getting violent with all dissenters at the end of the book anyway. 

There simply is no polite way to put it. Cherry picking is the only way they can get around this bully of a god. But, as liberal and non violent one might claim they are, that same bible is used to justify harm to others by others. It is the same source all Christians use regardless of individual interpretations that lead to any act, good or bad.

(August 12, 2015 at 8:38 pm)Cephus Wrote:

(August 12, 2015 at 7:37 pm)Minimalist Wrote: The same is true of the US constitution to the never-ending annoyance of xtian fucktards everywhere.

Again, the word you need is "secular."

Atheism is, by its very nature, secular.

But secularism is not, by its very nature, atheist.

And that is where your mistake lies.