This is why I hate people who hate "fucking christians"

[Bad Writer]

Ha Ha Ha, yeah sure. People base their inner doubts on how misbehaved unconvinced people are.. Right.. Citation seriously needed..

Just ask min and cijin how many people they have driven away from finding out about atheism.

What's there to find out? One doesn't believe in a deity and, bam, he/she's an atheist! Nothing beyond that...unless you know something we don't.

[Lion IRC]

[snip]...As for Jacob's "we're all equally bad" claim, I don't think it's true, useful, or applicable to the issue. I don't think it's true because atheists are, on the whole, non-violent.[snip]

If I gave the impression that I thought atheists were AS BAD then I apologise. Theists are clearly worse, hence the comment about the risk that atheist groups could exhibit similar behavior to theist ones. We're there ahead of you, no doubt. More cliquey. More prejudiced. More inclined to try to graft our views onto others.

@Jacob(smooth)

Do you agree with the above, that atheists are, on the whole, less violent in relative terms compared to humans who profess biblical theistic religion? Are they inherently more 'peaceful' as human beings than Christians? FWIW - I regard Maoism and Stalinism as inherently opposed to theistic religion and methodologically commited to the use of force where necessary to oppose "the opium of the masses.

---

And I think self-harm qualifies as violence per se.

[Polaris]

Just ask min and cijin how many people they have driven away from finding out about atheism.

What's there to find out? One doesn't believe in a deity and, bam, he/she's an atheist! Nothing beyond that...unless you know something we don't.

Yes....I've actually read some of the de-conversion stories and your post is highly ignorant of how difficult it was for many here to turn to atheism.

[Lion IRC]

One major difference between the "clique'' of Christianity and the "clique" of atheism is this;

"...If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray.''

See Luke 15:7 Matthew 18:12. If Jesus "hated" atheists He would not have us care about unbelievers. The 'concern' atheists have for Christians seems to have a rather different motive and style.

[Zazzy]

Are they inherently more 'peaceful' as human beings than Christians?

This wasn't directed to me, but I want to comment. I have known many atheists in my life (although not as many as Christians-duh). I have known smart and dumb atheists, nice and mean atheists, sane and insane atheists, and peaceful and violent atheists. I don't know if atheists are "more peaceful" or "less violent" as individuals. Mao and Stalin adhered to regimes as crazy and dogmatic as theism, and it's pretty far-out to say the violence in those regimes was perpetrated BECAUSE of atheism in the same way that say, the violence in the Inquisition was perpetrated because of religion (although much of that was political, too). I don't think that, on an individual level, it's fair to say that atheists are more peaceful.

I agree with Sam Harris in this quote:
I know of no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too desirous of evidence in support of their core beliefs.

[Whateverist]

If I gave the impression that I thought atheists were AS BAD then I apologise. Theists are clearly worse, hence the comment about the risk that atheist groups could exhibit similar behavior to theist ones. We're there ahead of you, no doubt. More cliquey. More prejudiced. More inclined to try to graft our views onto others.

@Jacob(smooth)

Do you agree with the above, that atheists are, on the whole, less violent in relative terms compared to humans who profess biblical theistic religion? Are they inherently more 'peaceful' as human beings than Christians? FWIW - I regard Maoism and Stalinism as inherently opposed to theistic religion and methodologically commited to the use of force where necessary to oppose "the opium of the masses.

---

And I think self-harm qualifies as violence per se.

I don't. It is utter bullshit to make such generalizations. The chief thing atheists and theists have in common is being human, and that covers a lot of territory.

---

One major difference between the "clique'' of Christianity and the "clique" of atheism is this;

"...If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray.''

See Luke 15:7 Matthew 18:12. If Jesus "hated" atheists He would not have us care about unbelievers. The 'concern' atheists have for Christians seems to have a rather different motive and style.

WTF???!!!

Does any one here actually keep sheep? What a crock.

[Lion IRC]

One major difference between the "clique'' of Christianity and the "clique" of atheism is this;

"...If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray.''

See Luke 15:7 Matthew 18:12. If Jesus "hated" atheists He would not have us care about unbelievers. The 'concern' atheists have for Christians seems to have a rather different motive and style.

WTF???!!!

Does any one here actually keep sheep? What a crock.

See what I mean the difference in concern between how they think of us and how we think of them?

[Whateverist]

What? Do you keep sheep?

[Brakeman]

See what I mean the difference in concern between how they think of us and how we think of them?

Have you ever heard the quip, "The christian army is the only army that shoots it's wounded?"

What do you think is meant by that and what is it referring to?

Or one more personally witnessed, do you think an atheist would stand up in the middle of a meeting and threaten the speaker with damnation if he didn't talk about the junk DNA and ERV's?

Do you think that an atheist would take a shotgun and pistol to an agnostics meeting and kill people because they aren't fully committed atheists?
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/news/local/...-shooting/

[Jacob(smooth)]

@Jacob(smooth)

Do you agree with the above, that atheists are, on the whole, less violent in relative terms compared to humans who profess biblical theistic religion? Are they inherently more 'peaceful' as human beings than Christians? FWIW - I regard Maoism and Stalinism as inherently opposed to theistic religion and methodologically commited to the use of force where necessary to oppose "the opium of the masses.

---

And I think self-harm qualifies as violence per se.

I don't. It is utter bullshit to make such generalizations. The chief thing atheists and theists have in common is being human, and that covers a lot of territory.

---

One major difference between the "clique'' of Christianity and the "clique" of atheism is this;

"...If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray.''

See Luke 15:7 Matthew 18:12. If Jesus "hated" atheists He would not have us care about unbelievers. The 'concern' atheists have for Christians seems to have a rather different motive and style.

WTF???!!!

Does any one here actually keep sheep? What a crock.

What this guy says.

Might as well ask if men are more violent than women. We all have it in us.