John Waters v Atheist Ireland

robindch

drkpower wrote: »

Advocate what you are for, not what you are against.

I am "for" the removal of religion from human society. I can't quite see how I can be in favour of that position without also appearing to be being "against" religion.

As a general point, I think you'd have less issue with atheism if you addressed the facts behind the topics under discussion, rather than forming your own opinion of what the forum members and other atheists feel, and then declaring that we/they are doing is insufficiently populist.

I haven't read all of your posts, but based upon the ones I have read, it seems to me that you're simply having a hard time adjusting to an environment in which religion is not longer accorded the infinite respect it received, and expected to receive, until relatively recently.

TheManWho

I thought John Waters would have realised there was no god after he wrote "they can't stop the spring" and it was entered in eurovision.

CDfm

Sam Vimes wrote: »

In order to get a secular state atheists should stop complaining about religious laws, education and hospitals? So in order to get a secular state they should stop arguing for a secular state

The hospitals were better when they were run by the nuns

Sam Vimes

CDfm wrote: »

The hospitals were better when they were run by the nuns

Was that because they believed in God or were they simply better at their job and possibly not as short staffed and underfunded?

dvpower

Atheists seem to have gained a reputation in recent times for being arrogant and aggressive (which is fairness is a step up from our previous reputation of being devil worshippers*). Fair or not, this view seems to have taken hold.

I attribute this in part to the likes of Dawkins and Hitchins. There is a touch of the polemic about them (esp. Hitchins), but its this that has given atheism a voice.

We do seem to spend a lot of time ridiculing religion. This is fair enough; ridiculing the ridiculous makes some sense. But in doing this we are also ridiculing the people who we would like to convince; the majority of people who aren't seriously religious, who are just in it for cultural reasons. Telling these people that they are akin to fairy worshippers isn't well received and potential allies are lost.

Less attention is given to the stuff that atheists would generally like to achieve (and that is achievable) like removing the churches from the management of swathes of the education system (something that I think there a board political consensus for). In fairness to the HAI, they’ve produced numerous documents outlining various political proposals, but debate on actual proposals doesn’t seem to gain much traction.




*or is it?

CerebralCortex

CDfm wrote: »

The hospitals were better when they were run by the nuns

I completely agree, we should really get our act together instead of lamenting a dead institution.

drkpower

robindch wrote: »

I am "for" the removal of religion from human society. I can't quite see how I can be in favour of that position without also appearing to be being "against" religion.

As a general point, I think you'd have less issue with atheism if you addressed the facts behind the topics under discussion, rather than forming your own opinion of what the forum members and other atheists feel, and then declaring that we/they are doing is insufficiently populist.

I haven't read all of your posts, but based upon the ones I have read, it seems to me that you're simply having a hard time adjusting to an environment in which religion is not longer accorded the infinite respect it received, and expected to receive, until relatively recently.

Your last paragraph is a prime example of the attitude problem that many atheists have!!

I am not religous; I have never particularly believed in God; I give it little respect; I mainly ignore it. However, I do respect many of those who are believers. I favour a secular society where religon is resepected but not involved in any significant area of public policy, particularly education and health.

But, based on my views on why atheism/secularism is missing an opportunity and my suggestions on how it could achieve much more than it currently does, instead of taking me on face value as someone who genuinely wants secularism to suceed, you relegate me to a believer who is having a tough time accepting my fall from grace.

Well done; no wonder atheism remains a niche area in a society where religon has never been at a lower ebb; the lost opportunity is startling; and all you can do is attempt to demean and discredit those who fundamentally agree with you.

Sparks

CDfm wrote: »

The hospitals were better when they were run by the nuns

No, the hospitals were better before they gutted the cleaning budgets and created a problem with MRSA...

CDfm

drkpower wrote: »

But, based on my views on why atheism/secularism is missing an opportunity and my suggestions on how it could achieve much more than it currently does, instead of taking me on face value as someone who genuinely wants secularism to suceed, you relegate me to a believer who is having a tough time accepting my fall from grace.

Did I miss something in John Waters article as I did not see him indicate any religious belief. My take on his argument is that the level of discussion at the Atheist Ireland AGM was juvenile and along the lines of where can we kidnap a host and desecrate it etc and by definition surprise that Ivana Bacik used that as a platform.

So taking that Ms Bacik has described herself as the only "card carrying Atheist" in the Oireachtas while you might not describe Atheism as a movement you might describe it as a demographic or electoral constituency. She seems to think it is.

CDfm

Sparks wrote: »

No, the hospitals were better before they gutted the cleaning budgets and created a problem with MRSA...

Perhaps this needs its own thread

CerebralCortex

CDfm wrote: »

Did I miss something in John Waters article as I did not see him indicate any religious belief. My take on his argument is that the level of discussion at the Atheist Ireland AGM was juvenile and along the lines of where can we kidnap a host and desecrate it etc and by definition surprise that Ivana Bacik used that as a platform...

I was there and that wasn't the case in fact the desecrator in question was challenged strongly. Although I didn't think what he was proposing was necessary he made a valid point. This is just another example of John Waters talking out his own rear end.

dvpower

CDfm wrote: »

Did I miss something in John Waters article as I did not see him indicate any religious belief.

Well, if one of his friends would have convinced half of the athiests to leave and another would have put a dent in the other half, I can't imagine that JW is an athiest.

But you'd have to ask his friends.

Zombrex

drkpower wrote: »

Your last paragraph is a prime example of the attitude problem that many atheists have!!

I am not religous; I have never particularly believed in God; I give it little respect; I mainly ignore it. However, I do respect many of those who are believers.

What do you mean when you say that?

Do you respect say a Christians right to shoot an abortion doctor? Or a Muslim's religious need to fly planes into buildings.

I imagine you don't respect an awful lot of believers. You respect the ones who aren't doing anything that directly effects you but ignoring the fact that this respect and shielding of religion from criticism satire and ridicule creates the environment where some dangerous and wacky ideas are tolerated.

Would you ridicule a Muslim leaders argument that Allah wants lots of men to become suicide bombers and kill the Great Satan?

Would you satire Scientology convincing millions to give over lots of money to them?

drkpower

Wicknight wrote: »

What do you mean when you say that?

Do you respect say a Christians right to shoot an abortion doctor? Or a Muslim's religious need to fly planes into buildings.

I imagine you don't respect an awful lot of believers. You respect the ones who aren't doing anything that directly effects you but ignoring the fact that this respect and shielding of religion from criticism satire and ridicule creates the environment where some dangerous and wacky ideas are tolerated.

Would you ridicule a Muslim leaders argument that Allah wants lots of men to become suicide bombers and kill the Great Satan?

Would you satire Scientology convincing millions to give over lots of money to them?

I meant what I said; I respect many of those who are believers. Clearly, I dont respect all.

And I have nothing against satire or ridicule on occasion; however, I feel that, with many atheists, it is close to the default position.

dvpower

@drkpower
Isn't John Water's article an example of the kind of delusions of intellectual superiority and unfunny mockery that you're complaining about?

drkpower

dvpower wrote: »

@drkpower
Isn't John Water's article an example of the kind of delusions of intellectual superiority and unfunny mockery that you're complaining about?

Absolutely; JW talks more sh!te than a bunch of atheists locked into a room talking about atheism.....:D
I refer you to my opening post.

drkpower wrote: »

Waters talks an awful load of sh!te but dont let the messenger blunt the thrust of the message which atheists/secularists really need to heed.

sink

I'm with drkpower on this. I'm not an anti-theist, I don't care what supernatural beliefs one has and I don't buy the argument that i'm somehow enabling the fundamentalists by not confronting moderate theists. I believe that reactionary confrontational atheists actually create support for the fundamentalists and push moderates further to the loony fringe.

I don't see the destruction of religion as an achievable goal, or even one with much merit. Religion provides a crutch to people and some people need it, religion can turn the lives of depressed and unstable people around. So what if it's based on a lie, if it helps, let it. Doctors prescribe placebos all the time and in a lot of cases religion can do it better.

99% of believers do not infringe on my secular rights, they don't harass me or discriminate against me for my lack of belief and I don't harass or discriminate against them. We work perfectly well together in all aspects of life and many are people I would call my friends. The only real difference is on Sundays mornings they go to church and I sleep.

Granted the constitution needs to be revamped and all the religious references need to be taken out. Atheists need to realise that we're not the only ones who want secularisation, many theists do too. But so many of you are too prejudiced to even work with theists on a common goal.

I respect moderate secular theists more as people than I do many hard nosed atheists, who scoff at anyone with a supernatural belief. In the end it's a persons character which matters most not their beliefs!

dvpower

@drkpower.

I understand your concerns about the type of condescending attitude that atheists are accused of having. But take some (maybe extreme for the sake of it ) examples.

Take the tree stump in Rathkeale . There’s a part of me that says we should ridicule this. It’s really, really mad, but we tend to treat it with kid gloves. I’m sure that some of the people down there are quite reasonable folk in their day jobs, but I have a terrible inclination to shake them and tell them to cop themselves on. Is this athiest arrogance or common sense?

Take scientologists: I can’t see any positive benefits from this ‘religion’ at all. Should I respect it? Why? Why are some religions deemed to be dangerous and some not. It seems that it’s just a matter of getting yourself established, and establishment confers the cover of respectability.

And then take the mainstream religions. Quite bizarre dogma. Is there anything to respect in the religions themselves? I do think it’s difficult to justify a respect, whatever about the political realities.

CDfm

CerebralCortex wrote: »

I was there and that wasn't the case in fact the desecrator in question was challenged strongly. Although I didn't think what he was proposing was necessary he made a valid point. This is just another example of John Waters talking out his own rear end.

Thanks CC its good to see you post that and of course I wouldnt expect anything else from you:)

drkpower

dvpower wrote: »

Take the tree stump in Rathkeale . There’s a part of me that says we should ridicule this. It’s really, really mad, but we tend to treat it with kid gloves. I’m sure that some of the people down there are quite reasonable folk in their day jobs, but I have a terrible inclination to shake them and tell them to cop themselves on. Is this athiest arrogance or common sense?

Take scientologists: I can’t see any positive benefits from this ‘religion’ at all. Should I respect it? Why? Why are some religions deemed to be dangerous and some not. It seems that it’s just a matter of getting yourself established, and establishment confers the cover of respectability.

And then take the mainstream religions. Quite bizarre dogma. Is there anything to respect in the religions themselves? I do think it’s difficult to justify a respect, whatever about the political realities.

The tree stump is just mad; ignore it - it doesnt threaten anyone.
Scientologists are equally mad; on occasion they suck in the odd innocent with disastrous results so we need to be wary; but ignore them most of the time.
As for the main religons; sure, the inherent belief is hard to understand but plenty of good people genuinely believe for whatever reason..so let them believe.

But heres the thing; Ive spent the last paragraph commenting on how atheists may or may not deal with believers - THAT IS THE PROBLEM - it should not be about what they believe in - it should be about what you (atheism/secularism) believes in - that is what you should advocate and advance - the silent majority will follow - if the message is positive.

As I have said before, there is a massive amount of people who actually favour a secular approach. While fora like this may not be representative, try this for an experiment.... think of your family and friends who you know - how many of them do you think favour a system of government where religon does not have influence? - how many of them do not favour laws like the blasphemy law? - how many of them woul prefer (or at least would have little difficulty) if religon was not involved in education/health?

Now, think of how many have the opposite view?

Would I be right to say that the former is a much larger group? Yet, when these mattters are discussed in public, the secular view is barely taken seriously. I do not blame this all on Atheism inc. buut the athesim/secularism movement IS NOT HELPING and there really really really is a genuine chance for the secularist view to take a central role.

Personally I believe that the current state of the Church is temporary; they will regroup; serious atheists/secularists have an opportunity to use their weak position to strengthen theirs and make real change; alternatively, you can make hay and ridicule a few stupid fairy worshippers; whichever you prefer.....

dvpower

sink wrote: »

I'm with drkpower on this. I'm not an anti-theist, I don't care what supernatural beliefs one has and I don't buy the argument that i'm somehow enabling the fundamentalists by not confronting moderate theists. I believe that reactionary confrontational atheists actually create support for the fundamentalists and push moderates further to the loony fringe.

There's a real double standard at play here. Vocal non believers are often described as reactionary and confrontational but believers who, for example, have said that atheists are going to be sentenced to torture in hell for eternity and that they agree that this should happen to them, come in for no such criticism. Can you imagine an atheist proposing this as a punishment for a believer, for just believing? When you see this, then come and call athiests reactionary and confrontational.

sink wrote: »

I don't see the destruction of religion as an achievable goal, or even one with much merit.

Why no merit? If you don't accept the claims of religion as being true, why not want the destruction of it? (I agree its not achievable)

sink wrote: »

Religion provides a crutch to people and some people need it, religion can turn the lives of depressed and unstable people around. So what if it's based on a lie, if it helps, let it. Doctors prescribe placebos all the time and in a lot of cases religion can do it better.

I'm not sure that doctors are allowed perscribe placebos but I take the point. I can't wait to see what Santy brings me this year!;)

sink wrote: »

99% of believers do not infringe on my secular rights, they don't harass me or discriminate against me for my lack of belief and I don't harass or discriminate against them. We work perfectly well together in all aspects of life and many are people I would call my friends. The only real difference is on Sundays mornings they go to church and I sleep.

Nail on the head. But on the wrong head. We still have a situation where the church has a controlling influence on the education system, particulary at primary level and (to a lesser extent) in the health system. That's the problem. If we could have a proper seperation of church and state in this country then much of the conflict would disappear.

sink wrote: »

Granted the constitution needs to be revamped and all the religious references need to be taken out. Atheists need to realise that we're not the only ones who want secularisation, many theists do too. But so many of you are too prejudiced to even work with theists on a common goal.

I fully agree with that.

dvpower

drkpower wrote: »

The tree stump is just mad; ignore it - it doesnt threaten anyone.

Why is it mad, but Knock isn't or the Turin shroud isn't or the resurrection isn't? It’s just a matter of scale. I was around at the whole moving statues fiasco in the 80’s. It wasn’t considered mad. Lots of reasonable people accepted it.

drkpower wrote: »

Scientologists are equally mad; on occasion they suck in the odd innocent with disastrous results so we need to be wary; but ignore them most of the time.

I'd go along with this if we lived in a sceptical environment, but should we really ignore these fcuking scumbags?. I don’t think so. (If we think they are fcuking scumbags, we should definitely not ignore them)

drkpower wrote: »

As for the main religons; sure, the inherent belief is hard to understand but plenty of good people genuinely believe for whatever reason..so let them believe.

They have all been guilty of the most appalling crimes, which shred any moral authority that they might have held. I don’t think that they have the right to the free ride that you seem to want to give them. I think you are mixing up the understandable feelings of the adherents with the organisations themselves. I wouldn’t
want to offend any religious person, but I do think that the churches and organisations have passed their sell by date . I can’t muster much respect for them.

drkpower wrote: »

But heres the thing; Ive spent the last paragraph commenting on how atheists may or may not deal with believers - THAT IS THE PROBLEM - it should not be about what they believe in - it should be about what you (atheism/secularism) believes in - that is what you should advocate and advance - the silent majority will follow - if the message is positive.

I agree with this. Political atheists lack focus. There are a lot of smart, dedicated people out there , including a lot of posters here who could make a contribution .

All we need is leadership, Are you in?;)

drkpower

dvpower wrote: »

They have all been guilty of the most appalling crimes, which shred any moral authority that they might have held. I don’t think that they have the right to the free ride that you seem to want to give them. I think you are mixing up the understandable feelings of the adherents with the organisations themselves. I wouldn’t
want to offend any religious person, but I do think that the churches and organisations have passed their sell by date . I can’t muster much respect for them.

I agree with this. Political atheists lack focus. There are a lot of smart, dedicated people out there , including a lot of posters here who could make a contribution .

All we need is leadership, Are you in?;)

True; and I do separate the believer from the institution/organisation; personally I have very little time for the religon. But I do have time for the believers - in fairness, most of them actually have their own difficulties with the Church.

But, and I am repeating myself, atheism/secularism needs to stop defining itself by what it is against (although it could be argued that that is the very definition of atheism!!) - I want to see secularism garnering the support of the thousands who agree with it. Currently, they are out there but they are reluctant to support a movement that appears to be somewhat divisive.

lostexpectation

drkpower wrote: »

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0717/1224250844850.html

John Waters seems to be taking a pop at Atheist Ireland. What do people think about his criticisms? Here are my 2 cents, anyway...

drkpower doesn't understand the seriousness of satire.

look lots of strangers had turned to talk about something sorta awkard you use humour to break the ice, when do large public meetings ever get much done. it was a meet and greet.

dvpower

That's the problem. The level that the ‘ism’ is at is too basic; have a look at these boards. There are lots of smart people having long and tiresome discussions / arguments with Christians about evolution or about the historical accuracy of the bible or some other nonsense. Would you engage a person who had claimed to be alien abductees in the same manner?

drkpower

dvpower wrote: »

That's the problem. The level that the ‘ism’ is at is too basic; have a look at these boards. There are lots of smart people having long and tiresome discussions / arguments with Christians about evolution or about the historical accuracy of the bible or some other nonsense. Would you engage a person who had claimed to be alien abductees in the same manner?

Again, this is wher the athesit difficulty lies; that last sentence makes logical sense. And you should give yourself a pat on the back for it.

But what does it achieve? Nothing. You can equate religon with various things but, unfortunately, you have to deal with religon as it is,

Sam Vimes

I would engage them on the same level if there was an alien abductee organisation with over a billion members whose lives were being effected by this belief and if over 90% of the schools in the country were owned by the abductees

CDfm

lostexpectation wrote: »

drkpower doesn't understand the seriousness of satire.

it was a meet and greet.

It wasnt a meet and greet.

It was their AGM and it was their to inform members of their activities throughoutthe year, election of officers and activities for the coming year.Those entitled to speak were members.What they were discussing was policy.

The blasphemy law was an item for discussion but as with AGMs while the public may attend only members can speak. It was publicised that the blasphemy law was to be on the aghenda for discussion was intended.

Senator Bacik is also Reid Professor of Criminal law at Trinity and was the key speaker and is a practicing Barrister.

Sam Vimes

Anyone who put their hand up could speak. I put my hand up at one point and I'm not a member but they ran out of time and didn't get to me

Sam Vimes

drkpower wrote: »

atheism/secularism needs to stop defining itself by what it is against (although it could be argued that that is the very definition of atheism!!)

This is the major problem because that is the definition of atheism. What you're doing on this thread is essentially saying that we should stop being atheists and become secularists