RE: How Should We React When a ‘Militant Atheist’ Beats Up a Pastor?
October 28, 2013 at 9:50 pm
Here's the thing; atheism can't make you violent because atheism can't "make" you be anything, because atheism isn't A Thing. It's the ABSENCE of a thing. A-theism. Not athe-ism.
All being an atheist means is we don't have a particular cultural influence in our lives which most people, for better or worse, DO have. But it doesn't replace it with anything else. Being an atheist doesn't make you good or clever any more than not smoking makes you immortal. There's no reason this guy's lack of a belief in gods would preclude him from being a douchebag for any number of other reasons.
Of course there will be believers who will point to this as yet another instance of how not having God in your life inevitably leads to immoral behaviour, while ignoring the fact that this argument would suggest that HAVING God in your life would PREVENT immoral behaviour, despite human history consisting almost entirely of examples to the contrary...
All being an atheist means is we don't have a particular cultural influence in our lives which most people, for better or worse, DO have. But it doesn't replace it with anything else. Being an atheist doesn't make you good or clever any more than not smoking makes you immortal. There's no reason this guy's lack of a belief in gods would preclude him from being a douchebag for any number of other reasons.
Of course there will be believers who will point to this as yet another instance of how not having God in your life inevitably leads to immoral behaviour, while ignoring the fact that this argument would suggest that HAVING God in your life would PREVENT immoral behaviour, despite human history consisting almost entirely of examples to the contrary...
