Okay I'm back. Seeing as you are not allowing me to leave :p I will continue to discuss this until you understand my point of view.

Monte: "in no way shape or form did any of us, regardless of whether we are atheists, agnostics, or christian, say that view you badly for your disbelief in a god. in every response we have made, we have been crystal clear that we completely and utterly value your worldview, and respect it, and wont attack it as obviously wrong."

I disagree. My worldview was implied in my statement comparing StarWars fans to theists. This is my opinion. Which you go on to explain as being "intolerable". You have no evidence that I am intolerable to theists; most of my family are theists and I'm very tolerable of them. In fact; I have never even bridge the topic with them because it is them that would be intolerable and I value at least being on speaking terms with them. So to call me intolerable is at best presumptuous.

Monte: "in every way possible, we tried to explain that what we are upset by is YOUR intolerance of views outside of your own. so whereas we are completely tolerant of you"

If you are completely tolerant of my views; then why are you claiming that my views are offensive to you? Also please show me evidence that I'm intolerant of others worldview. Please don't take my passion for political topics to mean that I'm intolerant. I've already been called racist on this board and quite frankly I'm a bit tired of having my character repeatably disrespected on this board. Not by you; I might add; but in your case it would be hurtful considering I respect your judgement.


Monte: "... all we are doing is saying, its okay if you believe there is a god, its okay if you dont. (that is the definition of tolerance, so where you come off with these claims of the rest of us being intolerant, i dont know)."

I'm saying the same thing. I clearly stated earlier in the thread that it is impossible to disprove God for the same reason it is impossible to disprove dragons, fairies, bigfoot, ufos, pink elephants, etc.

Where we disagree is with my opinion that they are all in the same category. So what? It's my opinion. No where am I saying that you are wrong; I'm just saying that I have the same opinion of god as I do bigfoot. I can't prove it; I can't disprove it; it is irrelevant to my life; so I don't really put much effort into debating either way. It really is that simple.

Monte: "this is what you say about people who disagree with you ... you are wrong, atheism is clearly the only correct way, and on top of that you are intolerant if you dont agree with me."

Please show me where I said this. This is not my view. Seeing as I haven't said that; how did this get in your head? This is the part that makes it difficult to talk about theism with theists. You put words in my mouth; packaged the box; ridiculed it; and shipped it. But if go back and look; I didn't fit in that box; and you were arguing against an image in your head and not the words from my mouth.

Stewart is hilarious

According to Robert Jeffress, the Baptist pastor who called Mormonism a "cult", a nececessary condition of being tolerant of something is not to believe in the something.

Link to his podcast "Twilight's Last Gleaming" is currently broken.

according to americanresearchgroup, paul has jumped from 9% to 20% in the SC polls since jan 5. romney currently at 29%, gingrich at 25%.

and it stupefies me that evangelical christians support gingrich 40%. all someone has to do is air an ad reminding everyone of what he did to his first wife, and that number will plummet. ahhh the fickle bible belt voting mind.

okay, i understand your belief system as an atheist means that god=chewbacca as far as neither of them are real, while its impossible to disprove either.

im too tired to go into why i think the way you communicate your difference in beliefs (im just talking about atheism vs theism) tends to alienate and offend people who disagree with you.

I agree that my post had the potential to get people angry. I'm not perfect. I post at various stages in my life; while working; while playing; while traveling; while drunk; while tired; etc. Therefore sometimes I will word things in ways that offend people. But that is fine; it is only an internet forum; and I'm not hurting anyone in any meaningful way.

As for my beliefs on religion; sure. I think any atheist (btw; I hate that word) will tell you that even broaching the topic will inevitably result in hurting someones feelings or getting told your going to hell.

Btw; I hate the term atheist; because I am not anti-theism; no more then I am anti-bigfoot. I just do not think of the topic at all. The last time I thought of the term God was probably last time kdice had a similar debate.

Btw; it's awesome that RP is surging in the South Carolina polls.

http://americanresearchgroup.com/pres2012/primary/rep/sc/

Santorum is dropping like a rock too. Yay

Btw; this is how much the polls have changed in the last week in SC:

Mitt Romney 29% (-2)
Newt Gingrich 25% (+1)
Ron Paul 20% (+11)
Rick Perry 9% (+7)
Rick Santorum 7% (-17)
Jon Huntsman 1% (-1)

Amazing!

haven't had much time to be following the kdice clusterfuck of political debate, but I will add this by saying that I find it simply mind boggling that a cheezedick fart sniffer psychobabbling cock breath sack of shit drizzle like Rick Santorum could even register in the polls. For all intents and purposes, this former congressman douchebag extraordinaire of unspeakable proportions shows bona-fide characteristics of being quite frankly mentally ill by almost any standard.... and yet not only did this dysfunctional shit twat serve in congress there remains enough support (in the name of tens of thousands- the exact numbers I wouldn't know) by those who would actually have this cumshot fuckwad become leader of what remains the most powerful nation on the planet. In short, my perspective still remains as such. If a significant sector of the voting constituency remain so utterly delusional and easily swayed by pure unadulterated horsehit dogma and elect some borderline whacko fucktard into office, then I say, good on the whacko fucktard, he WINS on intelligence alone in actually pulling it off ! Who can blame him really. I can't. I'm more inclined to look at the collection of moron imbecile underdeveloped brain dead mouth breathers who let it happen... my regular visits to places like freeconservatives.com only helps to reinforce my opinion in all of the above.

until any of that changes, a given democracy at every level of government will always be at risk in spite of any sane and reasonable alternative candidate one might have at their disposal....

/rant.... off

I couple the relatively recent failures of our representative government with the privatization and destruction of the fourth estate.


Restore journalistic integrity by reinstating the fairness doctrine or other yellow journalism laws and we're likely to see a renewed and educated electorate.