Viper Squad Ten

[ Friday, August 18, 2006 ]

Your Religion Post(s)
Stuart [16:38] Comments: 4 []
 
Sub-editor in confronting editor shock!

I would like to posit the following:

1.When you bemoan religion, i think you mean only Christianity. I don't think you view other religions with the same distain, although I am not sure why. Maybe you (as I) know more about it than other faiths so it's easier to take pot shots at.

2. It is easy (and mostly valid) to decry religion for causing wars, hatred and prejudice. It's probably also okay to suggest, if that is your opinion, that people believe in God or a god because they are weak or fear death or whatever. HOWEVER where do you stand just slagging off people because of their choice of beliefs? The same place as you stand slagging people off because they're fat I guess, after all they can choose not to be, right? Or come to think of it the same place as you would stand slagging off people who DON'T believe in God.

3. As you say, everyone is irrational. It's in our nature. That's why we believe in love and souls and get married. Again, I'm not going to slag someone off for being irrational. Let he is without blame cast the first stone and wotnot (oops sorry that comes from the Bible)

4. I don't like hypocrites or murderers or warmongers. I like honest, upstanding, loving and kind people. Atheists and religious folks fall within both catergories. Sure if there was no religion there would be less war, in the same way as if the Beatles hadn't written Helter Skelter Charles Manson wouldn't have killed the people he did (possibly allegedly). What came first, religion or man's desire to hurt his fellow man? If there was no religion, wouldn't we have found another reason to behave like we do?

5. Don't lump together (as the report does) creationalism and intelligent design. One is clearly ridiculous (the former) the other is at best merely a manifestation of a belief that while things happened in a certain (evolutionary) way, there was something behind it. Perhaps on a purely scientific basis this is a contradiction. But a lot of people believe in God but don't believe the world was made in seven days. This no doubt comes down to degrees of irrationality, but see point 3 above.

6. Those stats are stats and we all know what they say about stats.

7. Nailing my colours to the mast, I am not particularly religious. I don't go to church but think in the back of my mind there is probably something "out there". (As you know) I just had a daughter. It was a (relatively) difficult and potentially risky delivery. At various points I prayed to a god I don't often pray to because there wasn't anyone else. When my daughter was born safe and sound and my wife was okay, I thanked that same god for the same reason. If you've got a problem with that, buster, come see me about it.

4 Comment(s):

Comment by Blogger Starbuck, at August 18, 2006 8:42 pm  :

Fair play, my friend. These pages are here for opinion, and its just because my words are all over the shop that my opinion gets heard the loudest. When it comes to belief, there's me at one end of the spectrum, you more in the middle, and DJ Tim at the other (whatever happened to DJ Tim?!)

I do try not to post too much about religion or belief, despite the subject being immeasurably important in my eyes. I accept that whilst I know I am right, those who do believe in a god also know that they are right, and there's no way aroud that.

However I do think that its important to - dare I say it - evangelise about atheism, what with the tides turning even more towards what I see as irrational and potentially dangerous thinking. Dangerous politically, potentially dangerous personally.

As for my own belief, as I've said before (such as in THIS COMMENT to my "Beggars Belief" post", I'm happy to acept that there it something out there that we can't explain, something hugely important that is shaping our very existence. From a cosomological point of view its much more likely than the apparent reality of there being nothing out there. However I personally don't think that it's going to be any of the gods that Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs or whomever believe in, or anything even approximating that. But if I'm not careful I'll start Matrix'ing and you know what that leads to...

Must put you straight about bemoaning just Christianity however, Stu. I do view all religions as equal (I hesitate to use the easy shot of equally bad").

I really haven't "got it in for" the Christian religion more than Islam or whatever. Belief in the creation myths for example doesn't discriminate - the admitedly-vague accounts in the Qur'an can be interpreted in much the same way, and since Islam teaches that everything happens according to God's will, Intelligent Design can be used to support evolutionary creationism (remebering that Allah is still the creator of everything and that Allah specifically created humanity).

Phew, thank you Wikipedia.

But want gets to me is the increase in small-mindedness, the increased importance being placed on religion in the UK, the way that its now getting too hot to handle. Examples, Jerry Springer The Opera - would they be able to introduce it now? Can we still not see Behzti?

Those with differing views might see my own views as small-minded, of course. For that I apologise. But it sometimes seems that everyone's taking sides, and its important that I nail my colours to the mast.

That's how I was feeling.

Now, if only kids could get a decent zience educashion...

Comment by Blogger Starbuck, at August 18, 2006 9:05 pm  :

Sorry!

I've just looked back over that response.

I'm as bad as a Jehovas Witness. In reverse.

I will now ban for the future my views on religion from this blog (until next time).

Anyway, that's enough from me. Big Brother's on (I'm so shallow!). And my wife keeps shouting "get them out"... at least I hope that she's watching Big Brother...

Comment by Blogger Stuart, at August 19, 2006 10:18 am  :

Hey man. I would no sooner you stop writing about whatever you want than stick pins underneath my fingernails - er well hold on there...

I hate censorship even more than sticking pins under my... oh I've done that.

But no but yes but no. Let's beg to differ. Although the difference between us is I don't know I'm right. To quote Kurt Cobain "You know you're right" - well you do, but I don't. Sorry about that Kurt.

And to conclude by continuing, whatever I think, people who protest against Jerry Springer and all that are a bunch of dicks anyway. In fact most of the more public religious types are.

The end (unless there is a heaven, in which case this is just the beginning...)

Comment by Blogger Starbuck, at August 19, 2006 10:36 am  :

Ha hah! And then you'll never let it lie...

(if I get there that is. I'm a bad mother.)

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