The Hazards of Belief

robindch

GO_Bear wrote: »

But its so funny !

Messing about with creationists who threaten to kill people is not a good idea:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/scottish-backpacker-stabbed-to-death-after-creationism-row-765266.html

Independent wrote:

A bizarre row about evolution versus creationism led to an (creationist) English backpacker fatally stabbing a (biologist) Scottish backpacker during a fruit-picking trip to earn money for their travels.

Alexander York, 33, from Essex, was sentenced to a maximum of five years in jail yesterday for the manslaughter of Rudi Boa, 28, a biomedical student from Inverness.

[...]

I'm sticking with Hazards.

Galvasean

joseph brand wrote: »

http://community.babycenter.com/post/a2517575/my_neighbor_gave_my_8-year-old_toy_dinosaurs.

I came across a similar question on answers.com a few years ago. Maybe it's a big problem for these fools.

Not letting your kids play with toy dinosaurs because you're a nut-job = child abuse IMO.

Kivaro

One dead and 16 injured at a faith healing event in Cape Town.

Maybe it was 'his' will.
Maybe it was a test of their faith.
Maybe it wasn't a good idea to leave the hospital to attend this event.
More here.

Galvasean

Riot after soccer match in Jerusalem. Jewish fans terrorize Muslims. Police appear uninterested.
http://storyful.com/stories/23608

CiaranMT

Anybody else get the Sunday Times today? Article on the front page about how little help faith healers have been in Irish missing persons cases.. Things behind a paywall though and can't be arsed typing it all out.

Stercus Accidit

CiaranMT wrote: »

Anybody else get the Sunday Times today? Article on the front page about how little help faith healers have been in Irish missing persons cases.. Things behind a paywall though and can't be arsed typing it all out.

It's those cheap knock off ju-ju beads they have been using, very shaky premonitions you get off them, very poor spiritual resonance you see from the lower cost materials.

When you want to find a missing person, insist on authentic ju-ju beads and spirit cup to rattle them in, operated by an accredited medium. (small or large just wont cut it)

Delirium

MPs try to overturn 'God can heal' ad ban

Last month, a Christian group in Bath were banned from using leaflets that said: "NEED HEALING? GOD CAN HEAL TODAY!... We believe that God loves you and can heal you from any sickness."

The ASA said the claims were misleading and could discourage people from seeking essential medical treatment.

Galvasean

koth wrote: »

MPs try to overturn 'God can heal' ad ban

A rare victory for common sense!

Links234

Church stages kidnappings: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/03/23/2710535/pa-church-conducts-mock-kidnapping.html

A southeastern Pennsylvania church subjected members of a youth group to a mock kidnapping and interrogations without telling them it was staged, and the outraged mother of one 14-year-old girl has filed a complaint with police.

amacachi

At first I didn't think it was a big deal til I saw even the parents weren't told :pac:

recedite

the focus of the lesson was "the persecuted church" in other countries.

I didn't realise they actually teach it, I thought the persecution complex came naturally.

joseph brand

http://coffeelovingskeptic.com/?p=1411

Author Sameem Ali is all too familiar with the trauma of being a child bride – she was only 13 years old when she was taken to Pakistan by her mother on a holiday.

As a teenager she was excited about the trip, but when she arrived at the family’s ancestral village, she discovered she was to be married to a man twice her age, whom she had never met.

“The whole family turned up with an imam and they forced me into this marriage. I didn’t really understand what was happening at the time.

“I was only a child. There was no way I could say no. There was no support there whatsoever.”

Eight months later she returned to the UK after suffering months of violent abuse.

“I was brought back to this country when I was 14 years old and pregnant,” she said.

I've seen programmes on tv where young girls are brought from their homes in English cities, where they enjoy the western culture and all it has to offer, to places in Pakistan, houses in the back arse of nowhere. They are married off to some farmer and they live like servants. Very scary stuff. There are people who work at trying to rescue these young girls.

Talk about sh1te parents? :mad:

joseph brand

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/28/new-york-city-schools-ban-loaded-words-from-tests/?hpt=hp_c3

Divorce. Dinosaurs, Birthdays. Religion. Halloween. Christmas. Television. These are a few of the 50-plus words and references the New York City Department of Education is hoping to ban from the city’s standardized tests.

"Dinosaur" is among the words New York CIty is looking to ban from tests, apparently over concerns it could bother creationists".

Well, we wouldn't want anyone to be bothered. :mad:

robindch

And in news from Austria, a cardinal overturns a priest's blocking of the election of a parish council member who happened to be gay:

https://www.religionnews.com/blogs/david-gibson/cardinal-okays-gay-man-for-parish-council

Not quite sure why a gay man would want to be on the parish council, but there you go.

joseph brand

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-l6_2a-1I4

Eric Hovind's father is in jail, for anyone who didn't already know.

This video displays perfectly the frustration of trying to talk openly and logically with a creationist. The term 'bang your head against a wall' springs to mind.

Thunderf00t is asked the same question around 18 times! He answered it the FIRST time.

fitz0

Time for the annual crucifixions as part of the 'celebration' of such a benevolent religion. Things like this genuinely defy belief. *ahem*

Sonics2k

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/philippines/9190345/Filipinos-re-enact-crucifixion-with-real-nails.html

Thousands gather to watch Filipino devotees in Pampanga province re-enact the crucifixion of Jesus Christ on Good Friday, using real nails driven through their hands and feet.

Sarky

Hope they got their tetanus shots.

The Mad Hatter

A story about a gay teenager in a Christian neighbourhood, that actually has a happy ending. This is very much worth a read (though I'm not sure since Sherlock's b*llocks whether I can quote from it here). Click through and read.

CL7

That story made me cry. Man I'm such a wuss. Brave kid.

robindch

Ratzinger says that mankind is "groping in the darkness, unable to distinguish good from evil":

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17649521

Sonics2k

robindch wrote: »

Ratzinger says that mankind is "groping in the darkness, unable to distinguish good from evil":

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17649521

*makes obvious groping pun*

Sarky

Apart perhaps from when he's asleep, that man is never not talking bollocks.

Links234

The Mad Hatter wrote: »

A story about a gay teenager in a Christian neighbourhood, that actually has a happy ending. This is very much worth a read (though I'm not sure since Sherlock's b*llocks whether I can quote from it here). Click through and read.

that was a powerful read

Galvasean

joseph brand wrote: »

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/28/new-york-city-schools-ban-loaded-words-from-tests/?hpt=hp_c3



Well, we wouldn't want anyone to be bothered. :mad:

Banning dinosaurs?

robindch

Mad bishop says that only christianity can protection against Nazism and Communism:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9193140/Bishop-warns-stripping-Britain-of-religion-leaves-country-vulnerable-to-extremism.html

Some Cleric in the UK wrote:

It has, indeed, been the experience of this past century, as both Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have observed how the most poisonous ideologies have arisen within the Christian nations of Europe. Thus Nazism or Communism attempted to discard the Christian inheritance of faith and morality as if it had never existed. They sought either to return to the pagan past or to “re-create” and “redeem” humanity by political will and ideology with terrible consequences. If Christianity is no longer to form the basis and the bedrock of our society then we are, indeed, left at the mercy of passing political projects and perhaps even the most sinister of ideologies.

Galvasean

"It has, indeed, been the experience of this past century, as both Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have observed how the most poisonous ideologies have arisen within the Christian nations of Europe"

Selective quoting FTW :pac:

robindch

Galvasean wrote: »

"It has, indeed, been the experience of this past century, as both Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have observed how the most poisonous ideologies have arisen within the Christian nations of Europe"

Ratzinger's observations no doubt helped by his first-hand experience of supporting the Nazi regime.

Selective memory, ftw!

The Mad Hatter

Galvasean wrote: »

"It has, indeed, been the experience of this past century, as both Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have observed how the most poisonous ideologies have arisen within the Christian nations of Europe"

Selective quoting FTW :pac:

In fairness, I think that's more a case of an absentee comma than a selective quote.

"It has, indeed, been the experience of this past century, as both BJPII and PBXVI have observed, how the most poisonous ideologies have arisen blah blah blah."

(I'm all about punctuation lately. I need better hobbies.)

Penn

Not quite religious belief, but belief in homeopathy. This is unbelievable...

http://www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2011/s3260776.htm

Gbear

Penn wrote: »

Not quite religious belief, but belief in homeopathy. This is unbelievable...

http://www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2011/s3260776.htm

It's easy to trot out Caveat Emptor until you read something like that.

Homeopaths are scumbags and are all either liars or dangerously stupid.

The Mad Hatter

Penn wrote: »

Not quite religious belief, but belief in homeopathy. This is unbelievable...

http://www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2011/s3260776.htm

:eek:

MrPudding

Penn wrote: »

Not quite religious belief, but belief in homeopathy. This is unbelievable...

http://www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2011/s3260776.htm

I am somewhat conflicted about this story. Like the victims of the psychics, I have some sympathy, but how much medical advice and how many medical practitioners must this woman have ignored in order to drop all conventional treatment?

MrP

joseph brand

Dated 2009, but a very interesting read.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2009/aug/19/religion-catholic-agnostic

That's just the Anglicans. Other Protestant sects are even worse: my prize for malignity going to the Jehovah's Witnesses, whose leadership denies followers blood transfusions even in medical emergencies, on pain of being cut off from all fellowship even with relatives, because of some bizarre misreading of a solitary obscure Biblical text written in an age long before transfusions were possible. Of course, the Watchtower leadership in Brooklyn do not deny transfusions to themselves; they just don't boast about it.

Don't get me started on Catholicism. A South American bishop was recently censured for excommunicating the medical staff who had carried out an abortion on a nine year-old child to save her life after she had been raped by her father, but the fact that he saw nothing wrong with his decision – he also excommunicated the child's mother, though not her father – is a dazzling revelation of church attitudes that are all too common.

The Mad Hatter

MrPudding wrote: »

I am somewhat conflicted about this story. Like the victims of the psychics, I have some sympathy, but how much medical advice and how many medical practitioners must this woman have ignored in order to drop all conventional treatment?

MrP

From the letter, it sounds like the alternative medicine lady was a friend to her as well - like it or not, we're inclined to trust our friends on this sort of thing, especially when they claim "expertise."

Galvasean

And people wonder why I'm a homeophobe..

Penn

The Mad Hatter wrote: »

From the letter, it sounds like the alternative medicine lady was a friend to her as well - like it or not, we're inclined to trust our friends on this sort of thing, especially when they claim "expertise."

Plus, the medical side never claimed they could definitely cure her.

I was probably overly harsh in the other thread (the one about the psychics who conned millions out of people) when I said the victims of a plot like that almost deserved it for being stupid. Sometimes the victims of plots like these are exactly that.... victims.

Look Ma, I'm growing as a person!

Galvasean

Penn wrote: »

I was probably overly harsh in the other thread (the one about the psychics who conned millions out of people) when I said the victims of a plot like that almost deserved it for being stupid. Sometimes the victims of plots like these are exactly that.... victims.

Look Ma, I'm growing as a person!

Sadly, the unscrupulous homeopaths, psychics and snake oil merchants are not...

robindch

"Teen Pregnancies Highest In States With Abstinence-Only Policies"

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/04/10/461402/teen-pregnancy-sex-education

Think Progress wrote:

The number of teen births in the U.S. dropped again in 2010, according to a government report, with nearly every state seeing a decrease. Nationally, the rate fell 9 percent to about 34 per 1,000 girls ages 15 through 19, and the drop was seen among all racial and ethnic groups. Mississippi continues to have the highest teen birth rate, with 55 births per 1,000 girls. New Hampshire has the lowest rate at just under 16 births per 1,000 girls.

This is the lowest national rate for teen births since the Centers for Disease Control began tracking it in 1940, and CDC officials attributed the decline to pregnancy prevention efforts. Other reports show that teenagers are having less sex and using contraception more often. Studies have backed this up. Researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle found that teenagers who received some type of comprehensive sex education were 60 percent less likely to get pregnant or get someone else pregnant. And in 2007, a federal report showed that abstinence-only programs had “no impacts on rates of sexual abstinence.” But 37 states require sex education that includes abstinence, 26 of which require that abstinence be stressed as the best method. Additionally, research shows that abstinence-only strategies could deter contraceptive use among teenagers, thus increasing their risk of unintended pregnancy.

[...] Mississippi does not require sex education in schools, but when it is taught, abstinence-only education is the state standard. New Mexico, which has the second highest teen birth rate, does not require sex ed and has no requirements on what should be included when it is taught. New Hampshire, on the other hand, requires comprehensive sex education in schools that includes abstinence and information about condoms and contraception.

Delirium

Leading Indian Rationalist facing blasphemy charges over miracle clash with Catholic Church

Sanal Edamaruku, Secretary General of the India-based organisation Rationalist International, is facing charges of blasphemy after he exposed a "miracle" involving a crucifix statue in the Vile Parle area of Mumbai.

On 10 March, Edamuruku, who is well-known in India for his debunking of supposed miracles and the abilities claimed by religious gurus (see this 2008 piece for New Humanist), was invited by the TV-9 channel to visit the Church of Our Lady of Velankanni in Vile Parle, where water had begun dripping from the feet of a statue of the crucified Christ. Worshippers claimed that this was "holy water", and the crowds flocked to the church to collect the miraculous liquid in containers.

Upon inspection, Edamuruku was able to reveal that the source of the "miracle" was a leaking drainage system, the water from which was being sucked up and ejected through the nail holes of the crucifix via a capillary action.

Sarky

That water would be filthy, I hope nobody was dumb enough to... Oh, who am I kidding, of course someone drank it.

Delirium

Australia's most senior-ranked Catholic says Jews 'intellectually and morally inferior'

In a widely watched televised debate – which led to ongoing debate over the winner – Cardinal Pell said "the little Jewish people" were shepherds who lacked intellectual development.

"I've got a great admiration for the Jews but we don't need to exaggerate their contribution in their early days," he said on ABC television. "They weren't intellectually the equal of [the Egyptians or Persians] – intellectually, morally ... The poor – the little Jewish people, they were originally shepherds. They were stuck. They're still stuck between these great powers."

Sarky

Oh, Catholicism. You do it to yourself* really, and that's what makes it so funny.



*Well the rape you do to defenseless children, but in all other respects...

robindch

koth wrote: »

Australia's most senior-ranked Catholic says Jews 'intellectually and morally inferior'

That full debate is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD1QHO_AVZA

And this facepalm moment:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSo4zjTbokY

Hard to say who won. Dawkins lack of humor is no help in this kind of debate...

Delirium

Christian group (UK) books anti-gay ads to appear on buses

London buses have been booked to carry a Christian advertising campaign expected to start next week, which asserts the power of therapy to change the sexual orientation of gay people.

The full length advert, which will appear on five different routes in the capital, is backed by the Core Issues Trust whose leader, Mike Davies, believes "homoerotic behaviour is sinful". His charity funds "reparative therapy" for gay Christians who believe that they have homosexual feelings but want to become straight. The campaign is also backed by Anglican Mainstream, an worldwide orthodox Anglican group whose supporters have equated homosexuality with alcoholism.

Sarky

How long before Mike Davies is found in a brothel wearing suspenders, bra and surrounded by 3 Thai ladyboys?

Cossax

robindch wrote: »

That full debate is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD1QHO_AVZA

And this facepalm moment:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSo4zjTbokY

Hard to say who won. Dawkins lack of humor is no help in this kind of debate...

Granted I only watched the last 30 minutes or so but I don't think he had a lack of humour in what I saw? It wasn't really a debate, per se, so I'm not sure there was ever going to be a winner/loser especially with the nature of some of the questions.

Gbear

koth wrote: »

Christian group (UK) books anti-gay ads to appear on buses

I wonder could they get away with stating that therapy and faith in god could turn black people white?
Can you advertise with factually incorrect statements?

joseph brand

robindch wrote: »

That full debate is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD1QHO_AVZA

And this facepalm moment:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSo4zjTbokY

Hard to say who won. Dawkins lack of humor is no help in this kind of debate...

I think Dawkins is tiring of the same old questions. He is always asked about where we would get our morals from, in the absence of religion. You'll notice him look up to the ceiling in many debates when asked this garbage.

You're right about his 'lack of humor', but as he mentioned himself when he tried to remember Julia Sweeney, he was suffering jet lag. Wouldn't it have been great if Dawkins were able to tag Hitchens, who could then take his place half-way through, and just go straight for Pell's jugular.

There was nothing at all new in this debate, same old same old. I'd say Dawkins was mainly looking forward to his talk with Krauss. Far more interesting and mentally stimulating.

BTW, judging by the vote results, Dawkins was the winner.

Delirium

Gbear wrote: »

I wonder could they get away with stating that therapy and faith in god could turn black people white?
Can you advertise with factually incorrect statements?

Seems the mayor of London isn't too happy about the ads and has made a move to block them.

Anti-gay adverts on London buses blocked by Boris Johnson

A clearly angered Johnson said: "London is one of the most tolerant cities in the world and intolerant of intolerance. It is clearly offensive to suggest that being gay is an illness that someone recovers from and I am not prepared to have that suggestion driven around London on our buses."