Bah Humbug! Or have yourself an atheist holiday season

My grandparents, both in their seventies, active in the Catholic community, outright forced me to watch a special on the Stonewall riots.

They call themselves seamstresses -Feet Of Clay

What, then, qualifies as a "passive and positive" display? I mean, apparently a sign wishing people a safe, happy holiday season counts as offensive.

What is offensive about asking people to celebrate reason? You know that method of thinking that brought us highways and billboards in the first place.

Since when? The people protesting atheist signs are usually the same people promoting missionary work overseas to convert people away from other religions.

You repeated yourself here.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

I think we should start quoting in this thread, it's getting hard to tell who's talking to who with all the ninja'ing.

go ahead and do every stupid thing you can imagine

Again, I approve of non-theistic Christmas displays. I'd approve of satanic Christmas displays, if only to prove "Yes, if you don't like THIS religion being presented, how do you think that makes everyone else feel?" But I think the Skeletal Crucified Santa is just kind of inflammatory.

No need to make Fox News and their "War on Christmas" actually right for once.

@blue

Yes, I know I repeated myself. That was kind of the entire point.

They call themselves seamstresses -Feet Of Clay

It was supposed to be a juxtaposition of the "death" of Christmas due to commercialism or something like that.

@Penta The unfortunate reality is that at least in the US (and Canada) still a majority look down on atheists..so they actually care very much.

Why?

As I mentioned before, it's the linking between morality and theistic belief, as in, morality stems from theistic belief, if you don't have it, thusly, you can't be a good person. That's the way the tropes play out for still a majority of the population.

edited 22nd Dec '11 11:44:10 AM by Karmakin

Democracy is the process in which we determine the government that we deserve

Christmas hasn't died due to commercialism. It's been reborn as a secular holiday. And that's a good thing.

Christmas died for our sins!

Not as I read it. The way you phrased things, it seemed as though it's okay for Christians to think they're superior for believing, but it's not okay for atheists to think Christians are stupid. The language and the phrasing of the first statement is less in-your-face offensive than the second, and while it may or may not be deliberate on your part, it does indicate your clear preference on the debate.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

@Karmakin: That is a fairly significant statement. Can you back that up with a statistic please?

Since religious pluralism has been a thing.

Probably difficult to get an accurate read on how many Christians are religious pluralists and how many are against it. “All roads lead to Rome” mentality is not all that uncommon, however.

Justice is a joy to the godly, but it terrifies evildoers.Proverbs21:15 FimFiction account.

What does that make the people who are injured or die on Black Friday? The most devout among us all?

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

The point was, it required a few leaps of logic to come to the conclusion that a passive Christian display was offensive, whereas an atheistic one was directly offensive.

They call themselves seamstresses -Feet Of Clay

It doesn't take "leaps of logic" it takes rational thought processing and an understanding that America is supposed to have a line drawn between Church and State.

I think, I sort of ignored half the thread up to this point <_<

So some trampled Wal-Mart worker is now the patron saint of capitalism, eh?

Justice is a joy to the godly, but it terrifies evildoers.Proverbs21:15 FimFiction account.

I admit to having no statistics, but IMX, most Christians do not believe that other religions are correct. Some may be better tolerated than others (ie Judeism) but only Christianity, normally their particular version of it, is correct.

also

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

There was a holler stating that this discussion was getting flame-y and I've read it and I have a few mod like comments to make and then I'm going to lock it.

• When people start making comments using words like implied or by default those are weasel words that allow the user to make a statement without having any factual evidence to support the statement.
• When you structure perceived opposites into a discussion like Irrational/Rational or Hate/Love or Atheist/Christians you are going to get conflict because as someone pointed out a couple of pages ago Values Dissonance.
• Matters of faith or non-faith are intensely personal and people find it difficult to remain objective when discussing them.
• Most people find it difficult to behave politely when talking about these things in a face to face environment where someone can actually punch you. It is harder here to maintain politeness.

This thread hasn't gotten out of control but it is headed that way. Let's just shut it down.

This has been discussed before, but the American legal system hasn't been very consistent about this.

Justice is a joy to the godly, but it terrifies evildoers.Proverbs21:15 FimFiction account.