I wish atheists would dump this attitude. Even late in the Usenet era of the internet (1995-ish), we on alt.atheism started to recognize that Christians were not necessarily stupid. Some of them certainly were but there were others who were obviously quite bright.
Human beings are complicated. Most of us are good in some areas and deficient in others. In most cases, calling a person, "stupid" because of a deficiency in one particular area is inappropriate and inaccurate. People do do stupid things but I think this applies to damn near all of us. We all do some stupid things sometimes.
The argument that belief in religious fairy tales is stupid is a good argument.
The argument that believers in religious fairy tales are stupid people is a bad argument. It's also a counter-productive argument because it stirs up ill-will against us.
To effectively advance the goal of promoting skeptical thought regarding religion, be merciless in attacking religion in the arena of logic and science but be mindful of the human equation. Attacking those who are guilty of nothing more than needing a fantasy crutch to get them through life is going to come across as cold and heartless. Most (perhaps all) people are swayed more by emotion over logic so going that route is not going to accomplish anything other than making you look like an asshole.
Human beings are complicated. Most of us are good in some areas and deficient in others. In most cases, calling a person, "stupid" because of a deficiency in one particular area is inappropriate and inaccurate. People do do stupid things but I think this applies to damn near all of us. We all do some stupid things sometimes.
The argument that belief in religious fairy tales is stupid is a good argument.
The argument that believers in religious fairy tales are stupid people is a bad argument. It's also a counter-productive argument because it stirs up ill-will against us.
To effectively advance the goal of promoting skeptical thought regarding religion, be merciless in attacking religion in the arena of logic and science but be mindful of the human equation. Attacking those who are guilty of nothing more than needing a fantasy crutch to get them through life is going to come across as cold and heartless. Most (perhaps all) people are swayed more by emotion over logic so going that route is not going to accomplish anything other than making you look like an asshole.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
