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Atheist who grew up in Oklahoma here. The people in this thread who think that the correct tactic is to immediately jump to "Why is your religion better than Ma

Atheist who grew up in Oklahoma here. The people in this thread who think that the correct tactic is to immediately jump to "Why is your religion better than Mayan creation myths?" are completely clueless. If you ever even met a creationist, you would know that that would just make them dig in their heels and "confirm" their low opinion of mainstream science. The idea of tiptoeing around religious fundamentalism may bother you, but ultimately you have to decide if you want to be as "right" as possible or if you want to have a shot at convincing someone. And if you don't care about convincing the kind of person who can be a young earth creationist in 2014, then I don't know why you'd even pay attention to any of this.

salgernon 13y ago
I'm an atheist that spent my teenage years at a quasi religious military school in south Texas. There was a school chaplain. There were bullies that assumed that since I didn't believe in god, I must therefore worship satan. I had a revolver held to my head for this when I was 15. Loaded? Dunno. No reason to think that it wasn't. He did this because he wanted me to renounce my beliefs, which I didn't do before someone pulled him away... My point being that these are not rational people, they cannot be reasoned with or taught reality. They wallow and take pride in their ignorance with a "god said it I believe it that settles it" conviction. It won't do them by good in the end, since they will die and release their carbon like the rest of us, but to the extent that they hurt society by their insistence that fairy stories should govern our lives, discourage understanding our universe and preach their bigoted filth, we should give them no truck and no platform. They are worthy of our contempt and scorn and public ridicule, but there is no point in debating them.

salgernon 13y ago

I'm an atheist that spent my teenage years at a quasi religious military school in south Texas. There was a school chaplain. There were bullies that assumed that since I didn't believe in god, I must therefore worship satan. I had a revolver held to my head for this when I was 15. Loaded? Dunno. No reason to think that it wasn't. He did this because he wanted me to renounce my beliefs, which I didn't do before someone pulled him away... My point being that these are not rational people, they cannot be reasoned with or taught reality. They wallow and take pride in their ignorance with a "god said it I believe it that settles it" conviction. It won't do them by good in the end, since they will die and release their carbon like the rest of us, but to the extent that they hurt society by their insistence that fairy stories should govern our lives, discourage understanding our universe and preach their bigoted filth, we should give them no truck and no platform. They are worthy of our contempt and scorn and public ridicule, but there is no point in debating them.