Do you wish there's a god?

[The Grand Nudger]

You ever argue with a fundie about the things that they don’t believe in?

Sure, all the time.  Fundie christianity has become an explicitly political movement based on the rejection of any sound governance whatsoever just as much as it's an extension of superstitious idiocy.

Most of the real handwringing about christianity on this site has more to do with that than anything else.   If the fundies kept their dicks in their pants and out of government alot of people would have no beef - but they can't.  

That’s sort of like what arguing with your typical atheist on the internet is like. Such atheists are not merely arguing against fundie arguments, but their atheism itself is formed in relationship to such arguments.  Even worse, they don’t even seem to understand evangelicals all that much either. I doubt a single fundie evangelical would ever suggest, as I have for someone like Belaqua, that he seems to understand a great deal about things I believe. But rather that atheists primary rely on caricatures of theistic views.

Sure, there are atheists who's specific rejection of a specific religion is based on the claims of that specific religion.  What else would it be based on?  Your doubts are naive.  Stick around, you'll find that fundies routinely praise "the good ones" as they shitpost about the rest.  

Just like you did.  

The difference between faith “luminaries” and the common joe on the street, is that the former has spent more time thinking through their beliefs, than the common joe. Sort of like one might say of a newly minted teenage atheist, fresh out rebelling against their religious parents, and the sort that attempt to think through various atheistic worldviews. What do such atheists luminaries, offer that the teenage angst atheists types don’t? More considered thoughts, ideas to think over, a conversation more reflective, than just flinging feces at each other.

Thinking alot about bullshit won't change the fact that it's bullshit.  Those common joes come here and attempt to swing the same arguments, in any case.  The luminary I asked the question about was every bit the creationist as the next idiot who's going to come here and bullshit us about gods design..and his inability to comprehend the mechanism of thought lay at the heart of his metaphysics and ideas on "souls". Ultimately, he was just the usual sort of nut we get here, with a bigger vocab - and, frankly, knew less than the nuts we have today about the subject matter he spectacularly failed to explain.

An ideal conversation, for me isn’t so much as an argument, or as combative as the sort of conversations that take place here, which appear more like games, and dick measuring contest, than anything else (which can be amusing on occasions). But one where people engage their beliefs, think through various criticism, reflect honesty, in order for people to form better understandings of themselves and others. This in short supply in theist vs atheist conversations. Two people spend most of their time talking past each other, or looking for a cheap quip to get kudos from their respective choirs.

The trouble is that you can't really accept or engage with the beliefs of the people you're questioning.  Nor can you accept any instance in which a person has accepted your own beliefs and reached an entirely different conclusion based on them. Complete and utter disconnect. That..and the simple fact of your being routinely incorrect about the things you'd like to "discuss" in a non-argumentative, non-combative way™.

I mean, welcome to af dude...one of the few places where you really aren't going to be able to float things that you might think are uncontroversial due to social norms and the stratification of faith based claims. One of the few places where you might hear things forcefully said that call not only the credibility or validity of these things you believe into question, but even their moral nature.

You didn't join up expecting to hear a chorus of "god is great..." I assume...?