(August 7, 2014 at 8:17 am)Tonus Wrote: You mention a recent tragedy (in this case, the flight shot down over Ukraine), ask if the person thinks things will ever get better (with the proper setup, the best you usually get is "I don't know") and then BAM! Offer up Jehovah as the answer! It's really no more complicated than that. Make the person express some level of despair, then offer up Yahweh as the magic cure. Funny how shallow it seemed from the other side.
Wait.
The whole sales pitch revolves around "A pretty rare tragedy just occurred which indicates that the entire world is completely falling apart. So, I can sigh you up for God, right?" Really?
"Will things ever get better than they were after [such and such tragedy]?" Um... yes. (Regression toward the mean springs to mind.) Those tragedies are outliers if you average out the shit that happens in the world. Bad shit happens, and good shit happens. Sometimes spectacularly bad shit happens, and sometimes spectacularly good shit happens. All they're doing is pointing at the spectacularly bad shit and trying to convince everyone that that is the norm.
Teenaged X-Files obsession + Bermuda Triangle episode + Self-led school research project = Atheist.
