(January 11, 2015 at 2:31 pm)Chuck Wrote:

(January 10, 2015 at 2:51 pm)strawdawg Wrote: I can see people not believing in God but why hate it?

I had two uncles neither believed in God, they didn't go to church. They were good family men and good providers. They didn't hate religion they just didn't want to hear it.

Because religion is not harmless. Furthermore it never puts on any appearance of being beneficial without this appearance being designed specifically to immediately further the cause of doing some much greater harm. If you don't hate religion, then either you don't care, or you are oblivious.

That is right religion is not harmless. Humans base their morality on religion and in turn affect politics and even control entire countries and have weapons. You cannot get rid of it, but to pretend it is harmless is dangerous. Religion must be treated as the weapon it is.

(January 11, 2015 at 2:47 pm)Brian37 Wrote:

(January 11, 2015 at 2:31 pm)Chuck Wrote: Because religion is not harmless. Furthermore it never puts on any appearance of being beneficial without this appearance being designed specifically to immediately further the cause of doing some much greater harm. If you don't hate religion, then either you don't care, or you are oblivious.

That is right religion is not harmless. Humans base their morality on religion and in turn affect politics and even control entire countries and have weapons. You cannot get rid of it, but to pretend it is harmless is dangerous. Religion must be treated as the weapon it is.

Pretty much its the worst weapon out there.

(January 10, 2015 at 2:51 pm)strawdawg Wrote: I can see people not believing in God but why hate it?

Ir would seem that your question was not really addressed.

I, and I am sure most atheists, do not hate god. We do not believe in god. There is nothing to hate. Religion however, you can see the distaste we have for that organization, so no point in reiterating.

(January 11, 2015 at 2:39 pm)ChadWooters Wrote:

(January 10, 2015 at 3:01 pm)Chad32 Wrote: igion. You don't have to be religious to be an evil person, but religion has a record of convincing otherwise good people to do bad things. ..Religion is a repugnan institution that holds people back more often than it lifts them up.

This post is a clear example of selection bias: see only the bad, ignore the good.

What good does religion do that can't be done otherwise? The best I can think of is charity work, which could be done just as well by a well funded humanist groups that don't include holy books with their food packages. Books that, more often than not, lead to division instead of unity.

Hm, well...

1. The hypocrisy. Religious people have a remarkable tendency to dismiss and mock any and all mythologies...except their's. Their's is very real. Take their's seriously, please NOW. They'll also pick and choose which parts they want to follow, so they'll make things tough for people who break one of their rules while simultaneously breaking some other rule themselves.

2. The greatly obnoxious concept of thinking you have the answer to everything when in fact you have no idea what you're talking about.

3. How much of an utter waste it is. The Pope quite literally sits on the answer to food problems for a few million people and thinks nothing of it. How much money has been wasted on building churches seemingly everywhere?

4. It makes people make horrible decisions. Oh, our kid's sick in a fatal but totally treatable way? Eh, the hospital's like ten minutes away, let's just pray.

5. The general idea that a large majority of the adults on this planet believe in fairy tales is an incredibly pathetic concept.

6. Their complete and total inability to keep it to themselves. Symbols of their religion must be everywhere, they must pray at public functions, they must go door to door bothering you.

7. The also greatly obnoxious concept of worshiping and praising a book you have not read, and then using that book to prop up positions it clearly does not support.

8. The demand for respect. They have done nothing to earn respect, in fact they have done a ton of things to lose it, but not only do they still insist they be given it, they want a higher level of respect than most other things are given. If I decided I didn't want to serve blonde people who came into a store where I worked, would anyone sympathize with me, let alone make laws to protect my right to do so?

Ya know, just to name a few things I can think of right now.

Hmm well if I misread the question, no I don't hate God, I hate religion. I have no feelings at all about fictional characters.

(January 11, 2015 at 2:52 pm)dyresand Wrote:

(January 11, 2015 at 2:47 pm)Brian37 Wrote: That is right religion is not harmless. Humans base their morality on religion and in turn affect politics and even control entire countries and have weapons. You cannot get rid of it, but to pretend it is harmless is dangerous. Religion must be treated as the weapon it is.

Pretty much its the worst weapon out there.

Well I often warn atheists not to go around treating a mere position as a moral code themselves. Even atheists are capable of holding bad ideas and 7 forming groups to promote those bad ideas. Ayn Rand certainly fucked up economic thought with "fuck you I got mine". And I have run into atheists who support Che as if you could rid a planet of 7 billion of the private sector, and also fail to realize that closed societies also invest in the global market.

There are attempts by atheists to form their own churches and while it seems harmless now, that is merely because they are in the minority status and are empathetic to that because they are living it right now. But if they turn the word "atheist" from a mere "off" position, into a moral code and mimic religion it can go on to become a religion, which it should not be treated as such.

Religion is anytime you treat something as group think as to be worshiped and blindly valued. The only thing that protects pluralism is common law, not clubs.

(January 11, 2015 at 3:20 pm)robvalue Wrote: Hmm well if I misread the question, no I don't hate God, I hate religion. I have no feelings at all about fictional characters.

I find myself in 100% agreement with this lol

Actually, skeletor is pretty horrible. Never liked him.

(January 11, 2015 at 5:04 pm)robvalue Wrote: Actually, skeletor is pretty horrible. Never liked him.