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

[Brakeman]

First, don't twist or add to my wording, ... Keeping religion out of government and the public arena, is a battle worth fighting. But, not allowing people the right to religious freedom is not. And that, is my point.

It is not up to you or me to erase religion from the planet. It is up to us to help foster an environment that is inviting and causes religious folks to explore reason and science. Religious people deserve the freedom to follow their faith however, and I don't want to be a part of any "mission" that starts dictating to those who don't think as I do, to think as I do.

I'm not wishing to twist your words at all, I'm hammering you to refine and clarify your proposal.

I haven't purported to push theists into Chinese style re-education camps or anything silly to take away any freedoms. Because people should have the freedom to think on their own, they should also have the "freedom" to be stupid and wrong. It is twisting the words of the conversation to insinuate that the AF forum, or the atheist community would ever purport to control others' minds. We simply counter those ideas that gods are the only way to a good future. We simply push dialog that reality is beater than magic and superstition. We push reason, but that is simply impossible to force on anyone. We certainly try hard to spoon feed it to the stubborn child-minded theists on this board, but there is no element of "force" involved, only dialog.

Since no one is purporting force, can you restate succinctly what about ancient misunderstanding of the world and institutionalized dishonesty (religion) should be unanswered by reasoned dialog because you think it goes too far?

An atheist group or community is just as vulnerable to that as a theist one. To think otherwise is, I suspect, the slippery slope to which diedre alluded. You won't ever make a religion. But you are vulnerable to the same pitfalls.

In most cases it would seem so, but not in this case because of the tools we use. There is no way to "overdose" on logic and reason. It's not even like water where you can drown. You only get into trouble when you diverge from logic and reason.

Rationality cannot be overdone, therefore there is no slippery slope and no hole to fall into. Once you enter the world of reality, you can't go too far inside.