tspikes51

I just got out of my Modern Social Problems class, which was a whole 50 minutes of the professor telling me and other people that fall under the Christian label that we were each intolerant because our religion prohibits practicing homosexuality. This is nothing new, almost every person in the acedemic world can't stand Christian people. Furthermore, she said that it isn't explicitly written in the Bible that sodomy is wrong, it is just an interpretation on the church's behalf, so that we can continue to have new members (like not being able to use birth control). Hello, it says in Leviticus 18:22 (in which God himself is speaking, not Paul or Moses) " 'Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.'" So God said himself for men not to have sex with other men. So the church, as well as all its followers are faulted, uninformed, unintelligent, and intolerant. Wait- doesn't that make her intolerant, faulted, uninformed, and unintelligent? She has read wrong, and put a stereotype into Christian people by saying that we make stuff up, like not being allowed to drink. Hold on- I, as a Christian person, don't believe drinking is wrong, because God himself says nowhere in the Bible to not drink. Hell, Timothy told somebody to drink wine so they would stop getting sick. People just need to know what they are talking about before they start hating things. Read the Bible before you start telling people that they're wrong. Just because I believe that Jesus died to save me from hell doesn't mean I believe anything else necessarily. It's stereotyping, and it's wrong.

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theburner

Unless the world experiences an apedemic of extreme enlightenment, there will always be intolerance. The only ways I have found to make a difference are:
1) Educate people, don't argue.
2) Monitor yourself to ensure you don't practice intolerance. This can be extremely self revealing, and challenge your background at times.

Other than that I agree that intolerance stinks, but at the same time some people revel in their intolerance.. Double edged sword..

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gondath

I hate when people are framing a debate on the wrong basis. I also especially hate when certain pompous professors force their ideas on the class. In most cases I have seen, a lot of the class is too afraid of what might happen to their grades if they disagree. Nevertheless, I have called out a professor in front of the entire class before even when no students were speaking at the time because I did pay to be there. Anyways, Christian is such a broad label. It must be hard to cram so many people into the same stereotype.

Halx

I, as an athiest, believe any life wisdom that you gain from reading a book that tells you to despise a certain subsection of people is pretty damn silly. I wont condemn you, but I certainly wont respect your opinion on the matter.

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tspikes51

I don't despise homosexuals, or anybody for that matter. In fact, I have been well acquainted with multiple gay people. I just don't agree with their practices. I think that man was made for woman, and woman for man, and that's how it should be. Why the hell else would we have two sexes?

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TheManOfGod

i think that people have taken christianity and made it more about the religion part, and less about the relationship it was meant to be... god didn't make all those rules, people did. "all those rules" tend to be the ones taht piss people off.

Halx

I'm not someone who looks at what we have and then tries to find a meaning for it all. I just live life and deal with *real* issues that affect *me* personally. If a dude wants to fuck another dude, I'll give him my thumbs up. It does not affect me in any way and therefore I reserve no judgement. If you do stick your nose in other people's affairs to tell them that they are wrong, then you're no better than those who preach hate for these same people.

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feelgood

He just pretty much spoke my mind.

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tspikes51

Again, I don't tell people that they're wrong about anything unless they really want to know what I think, and even then I'd probably tell them something like, "I don't think it's right, but you do what you want." I have never told any homosexuals that they are wrong, going to hell, or whatever. Telling people that they're wrong for what I don't think is right is just straight up hypocrisy. I do things that I don't think are right. I'm not worried about homosexuals here, I'm worried about people (and, no offense intended, Halx, you're being this way too sort of) making judgements on people who believe that Jesus Christ died to save them from their sins, and that God told us a couple things (which God did say, according to the Bible (which is your choice to believe or not, I'm not going to hold it against you) that a man having sex with another man is wrong). It's just like saying that because I am a registered Republican, I hate the impoverished, or because I'm an art (music) major, I smoke pot. I'm trying to get people to realize that all that "Christian" means is that a person believes that God created the universe (now I didn't say that evolution didn't take place), and that Jesus Christ died on the cross to save them from their sins. Nothing more. Period. It's like I'm white, so does that mean anything besides my skin color is white, and that my ancestor's skin was probably white too? No. Same way with Christianity. You're passing judgement on a Christian person because of a generalization.

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Halx

One of my best friends is a hardcore Christian. He's REALLY into it. I have no problem with him because he does not bring that stuff up around me and respects my beliefs. I can live with that.

To be honest, my basic philosophy insinuates that people who do believe in God are not particularly complete people. Whether their deficiency lie in logic, critical thinking or reality perception is a case-by-case thing, but either way, I don't believe any are qualified to dictate what is right and what is wrong. None of this means intolerance, to apply my statements to the subject. Perhaps you should create a little rant about stereotyping, though.

Here's the blunt truth: everyone uses stereotyping. It's a psychological tool that is built into the human psyche to speed up thought processes. It's a defense mechanism. You cannot escape it unless you somehow slow down your thoughts and rethink them every time you consider opening your mouth or typing a sentence. You're never going to escape your stereotypes.

So, if you're a Christian and you're tired of being thought of as a *typical* Christian, perhaps it's best if you don't identify yourself as one.

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Tinymidget

Religion to me always seemed more trivial then worthy of any high status in my life. In the early years of my life our family never forced ourselves into a “Church Sunday” contract; this could account for my views today, but then again, maybe not. Christians want to save, but ostracize and alienate in the process of trying. Ridiculing somebody that they cannot become Christian because they are “sub-standard” in God’s eyes is more dehumanizing than some war-time atrocities. You ask them to change themselves before God can change you, why? I realize I might have been an extremely harsh by comparing this to war-time atrocities; make no mistake, some people take it as such. These are my own personal opinions however.

As for literal translations of the bible, they are wrong. Take this article for example (it is on an atheist website, it quotes the bible. As to whether the quotes are ripped word for word is up to you to find out)

http://www.atheistalliance.org/humor/dr_laura.html

Ironically, this letter is in response to the Leviticus homosexuality argument that the original poster talks about.



"Here's the blunt truth: everyone uses stereotyping. It's a psychological tool that is built into the human psyche to speed up thought processes. It's a defense mechanism. You cannot escape it unless you somehow slow down your thoughts and rethink them every time you consider opening your mouth or typing a sentence. You're never going to escape your stereotypes."

Also, stereotyping also allows for (strangely) our own social systems to be set up on a stable hierarchical system. Hopefully you can see my idea for this...its pretty far-fetched. In my mind it works.

JustDisGuy

Well, seeing as how we're all sharing our opinions - I think that you guys are nuts.

I am a Christian. I have not memorized the Bible, and I don't get apoplectic when I see someone else sinning. In fact, I make a point of not judging others who sin - it's simply not my perogative, according the the tenets of my religion. God loves us all equally - we're His children and He is willing to forgive any sin that we honestly repent of. For all of us, there is Hope.

As far as homosexual practices go, even the evolutionists can agree that this is not a natural state of affairs (pardon the pun). The very <i>name</i> of the act of sodomy is based on Christian history - remember the story of Sodom and Gohmorrah, and Lot's wife? Of course the Bible and the Christian religion practioners say it's wrong. By definition, homosexuals cannot survive beyond a single generation - well, until the Supreme Courts started granting them the right to adopt children, anyway.

I don't have the facts to back this up, but I recently read that the tolerance of homosexuality was one of the symptoms and perhaps even one of the <i>causes</i> of the fall of the Roman Empire. Those who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it, eh?

The unrelenting attack on the nuclear family, which was the primary 'building block' of our society is bringing that society to its knees. Your highly touted "Tolerance" will be our doom.

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MrFlux

Maybe we should get this thread back on track, there's a homosexuality thread in Philosophy if you want to talk about that.

I, too, dislike intolerance. Although, that's kinda subjective, because basically everyone's intolerant of some things, i.e. murder and rape.

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tspikes51

Yes, MrFlux, I agree, but not tolerating some things are necessary for the protection of our "inalienable" rights.

Halx: I don't like to call myself a Christian (as I've said before on this forum), , nor have I identified myself as one. I just said that I fall under that label (as I've said before on this forum), it's the label that is put on me because I go to church and believe that Jesus died to save me. Also, how am I not a complete person? My view of reality apparently is not skewed by my beliefs, because the reality here is that I try not to judge people. Nor do I use my belief as a crutch, nor as an explaination for anything. I have just had personal experiences with God, to the extent that I can't deny that he is there. It definately isn't stupidity, I welcome challenge to what I believe. You are right, however, to say that I am not "qualified to dictate what is right and what is wrong," but to the same extent of not being qualified as anybody else who has any belief at all, and we all believe something or other. I was aware that everybody uses stereotyping, but maybe you should explain to me why I am not complete. I agree that most "Christians" are assholish about certian matters, and put a bad spin on the religion. I am just trying to get you to think about why you, as well as others, are bashing my beliefs. I encourage you to make me think about my beliefs as well. By the way, I my best friend is an atheist, and he told me the exact thing that you said about your friend.

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Squishor

I find it ironic that a member of one of the most intolerant religions in the history of humankind is protesting intolerance in an academic lecture. Christians today are most fortunate that their church has evolved to the point that it is allowing its followers to think for themselves.

MSD

Even when people band together for the purpose of preaching tolerance, they are likely to become violently opposed and intolerant toward those with a different view on the subject.

Ustwo

Heh I once had a professor who was an ultra liberal and who thought his crowning achievement was that he got conscientious objector status granted instead of going to Vietnam. This was during the Reagan years and needless to say he didn't care for my paper on SDI, or any other views I held. It was an ethics class and I was happy to state my positions, and while the rest of the students basically cowered in fear of this guy, I decided to not back down. I may have gotten a C in the class (on my paper he made one mark, gave me a C, and when I asked him why he gave me 'Are you arguing with me!' B.S.) All I can say is it was the best C I ever earned :P

A bit of irony is this was at a Catholic school.

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tspikes51

So based on what you're saying, I am white, so in being white it is ironic that I am protesting intolerance because my race has had a history of it??? There's no way that I can be responsible for the history of what my "religion" is. On the other hand, what would you say if I claimed to have some beliefs rooted in Hinduism (which I do). I am curious.

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Squishor

I didn't say anything about race or skin color. That is something you're born with, not a choice. I could have chosen Christianity but didn't, based in part on its history of intolerance towards those of differing beliefs. I am responsible for the choices I make, and for me personally that includes embracing a religion with a tremendously violent history. Others obviously feel differently about it.

As for Hinduism, it is much more diverse than Chistianity because they have a plethora of gods, each with their various mythologies and traditions that go along with them. Your practices in life would be very different if you were a follower of Kali or of Parvati. And I am not aware of a history of Hindus trying to conquer and convert entire nations to their way of thinking, although there is the problem with Pakistan to consider.

skier

Yeah disguy, Tolerance sure is crummy. I mean, with tolerance, you get people that live differently than other people. A tolerant society will be filled with people that have widely varying perspectives and differing views. It would be flexible and willing to change with time instead of rigid and unbending, or "stable". I sure wish society stayed the same forever, where women were happily repressed and we were allowed to hate the reds and them cotton pickin blacks. I'm tired of tolerating thier freedom of expression and equality.

We shouldn't have to tolerate immigrants or homosexuals. I'm not all that comfortable around left-handed people either. I hope that someday the only people that affect me and interact with me are those in my "in" group- white middle class christian families with two and a half kids. How dare tolerance attack my traditions and habits.

etc and so on.

The point i'm making is that just because we did it before doesn't mean it's better than what's happening now. Culture and society should change, not stagnate. The fall of the roman empire was a fall into decadence(no change), then finally a growing economic pressure from greater asia collapsing the rapidly crumbing romans.

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Suave

Hello, it says in Leviticus 18:22 (in which God himself is speaking, not Paul or Moses) " 'Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.'" So God said himself for men not to have sex with other men.


That little quotation right there is a perfect example of interpretation and religious texts. You take it to mean "don't bone men" because it's detestable, whereas a more liberal-thinking person could take it to mean "use a different sexual technique with men than with women" because trying to hide salami within more salami is a detestable practice.

At any rate, intolerance is a bitch, but you know what? If you get all pissy at intolerant people, you're just being intolerant towards them. It's a grand paradox. I say just let people have their beliefs and biases. I'm not saying don't debate them, but being intolerant towards intolerant people makes you intolerant yourself and therefore a hypocrite. Yeah, I'm a pain.

And Halx, it's too bad you're an atheist. It doesn't take much effort to keep an open mind about life after death.

Halx

Or, you could be like me and not give a shit. That's tolerance if I ever saw it. Where you begin to see resistance is when others try to encroach upon a tolerant person's way of life. Your 'paradox' does not exist in a state of complete tolerance.

Also, the moment you catch me foregoing pleasure in favor of a positive judgement in the afterlife, slap me.

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spindles

I find this discussion quite interesting - it may well be something that might fit better in philosophy, but here is my 2 cents worth (remember that the Aussie dollar ain't worth much so 2 of my cents is worth even less )

Firstly, I think there would be a lot of Christians that are intolerant about your hindu tendencies.
Also, my thinking is that the bible is a book written by MAN - it may have been done with divine guidance - it may not (this really is the biggie IMHO as far as christians vs non-christians are concerned). This is especially true with the old testament (I think it is a lot easy to justify the new testament as writing of men - much of it is just documenting history).

Given that it is a book written by men, then the validity of the content also rests heavily on whether you believe the divine guidance thing. Basically, if you don't have faith that it is a divinely inspired work, then it is no better than taking inspration from a Jackie Collins novel.

On the subject of Intolerance - I think everybody is intolerant of something and of different things at different times. Some examples:
Did America show tolerance to Saddam?
Are Americans showing tolerance to George W.?
Was my wife tolerant of me working until 7pm last night

I think especially in the area of religion as intolerance huge - hands up who has got the shits when the mormons knock on your door early on a Saturday morning?; or mouthed off when the Hari Krishnas have marched by banging their drums.

Perhaps Christians are being intolerant when they try to convert us non-Christians, even though they think they are doing the right thing...

BTW - my wife is a regular church goer and I often join her (and her friends) at bible study - though I definitely am not a believer (and they are all aware of that). I don't necessarily see that as wrong - it is like discussing that Jackie Collins novel.

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RAGEAngel9

I think alot of the problems with religion, and Christianity in specifics here, is that they are completely suseptible(sp?) to human problems over the centuries.
**OK warning- I will be using the Catholics for my next exmples **
I mean anyone who still believe the Bible is the same book as 1900 years ago is just plain stupid. That book gets changed every 400 years or so, when the Church (Catholics) decide they need to to survive another 400 years at the top.
Also, I keep hearing that the Old Testement is not usable and others say it is. If it is usable still, where's my slaves dammit. If it isn't, then there's no record of God saying we should stone the gays.

I find it funny that our President looks to God for advice on what to do with war, when God's Son was the biggest pacifist of all time.

Religion would be better if there was one "law"

"Be excellent to one another"

Glory's Sun

In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point. --Nietzsche

ngdawg

Uh...Vietnam ended during the Nixon/Ford administrations. Unless you mean going to school was during the Reagan years, in which case, nevermind...Damn, I'm so intolerant of myself....
My intolerance lies in one simple thing....who was doing the note-taking while God supposedly was saying all those things?

Pacifier

Well believe in a "holy" book (merely a collection of tribal myth) that teaches intolerance.
Additionally the Church has a rich tradition in "interpreting" the bible in different ways.
So yes, I view people who really believing the bible (or the church) word for word with suspicion and most of them are hypocrites.

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sushiboy

If you say intolerant people suck, aren't you being intolerant too?

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seep

Basically, yeah.

Anyone who actually stands for anything is going to be "intolerant" of things and "hate" things. Unless we devolve into a society where people do nothing but scratch their asses and jack off, there will always be people complaining about how other people won't let them do whatever they want.

The first post in the thread was complaining about how intolerant a person was because she was complaining about intolerance, lol. I don't care about intolerance and hate, I'm just anti-stupidity.

I don't really care about homosexuality but it makes sense that right wing Christians would find it immoral because they follow a crazy religion. They can believe whatever they want, I just avoid them because they aggravate me.

tspikes51

What I have been trying to accomplish is two-fold. First, I was trying to get people to reconsider the fact that most people think that all people that believe in a god (notice that I didn't use the word religion) are something other than somebody who believes in a god. I am not going to think anything about you not believing in a god. My mission in life is to love, not to condemn. I was just assuming that somebody would come in here with an open mind and maybe consider my point, which some of you have done. Some of you, however have put me off as having a skewed vision of the world, or just being some devout asshole that knocks on peoples doors at six in the morning, having no idea why I believe what I do. I am, however somebody who questions everyday my beliefs. Second, I wanted to make you think about intolerance.

spindles, when you said "Thou shalt have no gods before me," you are suggesting that in Hinduism, you have to worship a god or gods. This is not true. You don't even have to recognize that there is a god, none the less worship one. So I insert God into a Hinddu situation, and go down the path of love in order to get to enlightenment.

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Suave

Exactly how I feel. I never said you couldn't have complete tolerance (of course there's always intolerance of encroachment on other people's rights, etc), but what he was saying was a hypocritical statement.

As to your second statement: you don't need to forego anything to be open-minded. If I didn't have a specific type of belief about death/the afterlife, I'd just be agnostic. No formal religion, no restrictions, no strings attached.

RAGE: Bill and Ted?

shrubbery

I don't believe God made man. I believe man made God.

One of the things that makes humans unique is that we always look for what caused things. That's what makes us intelligent and different from animals. But when you start searching for causes, you'll always have to go further and further.

I believe that man made the idea of God as a good-hearted way to find a simple and logical way to ease our minds of the 'problem' and soothe the masses. And what better way is it to tell people what to do?

But it's ignorant to follow the rules and guidelines written 2 millenias ago and apply it to modern society. If you'd look at the bible as a whole, and try to figure at what it really wants to say you'll find that the thought behind it is good and can be applied to modern society. I think one of the biggest problem today with religion is when people take religous books and think of them as 'rules' and start analyzing sentence for sentence, both in christianity and islam.

And the reason why religion (more so the church, really) is so disliked ïn the academic world is obvious, isn't it? Religion (especially christianity) has always opposed science and fought against it since the very beginning. How can you respect an institution that blatantly tries to hide the truth?

StickODynomite

Very well said... you took the words out of my mouth.

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spindles

I must admit to having absolutely no idea about what Hindus believe - I was just assuming that they do believe in some higher power. If not - ignore that bit of my previous post...

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JustDisGuy

Modern Christianity under the New Covenant has two laws. Love thy God, and Love thy Neighbor. From what I understand, most every major religion has some form of that second law, which essentially boils down to "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Sounds like an excellent world indeed.

Someone appeared to have misunderstood me, and implied that I was in favour of intolerance. Not at all. I try every day to live up the the two laws above, and don't draw the line at homosexuals. Where I do draw the line is in granting special interest groups (homosexuals, agnostics, whatever) sufficient authority to change the way in which our largely Christian population lives, in order to satisfy THEIR sense of propriety. In relation to the homosexual issue raised above, I believe that the traditional nuclear family is the underpinning of our society, and that unless steps are taken to protect and encourage that basic building block, we're pretty much done for. Of course, my religion tells me that I should be pleased, because if the end is near of course our reward is also near.

As for what went before not necessarily being better than what goes now, I will say only this. There are problems now, and there were problems then. One set of problems may or may not be worse than the other set. Here's what I know about that. When I was younger, we knew everyone in our neighborhood. We didn't lock our doors, our keys were in the ignition where they could be easily found and children respected their elders. Now, I know the names of some of my neighbors, we have double locked doors and an alarm system, we have a remote starter for the vehicle so that we can start it without having to leave the keys in it and the children on my block cuss better than any sailor, and as a matter of course. I happen to think our parents and their parents had it right, and we've gone and screwed things up by being too tolerant of deviants and special interest groups. Of course, there are shades of grey and nothing is black and white but being tolerant of someone's religion and granting homosexuals legal marital status are not the same thing at all.

LOL - what Truth is that? Seems to me that I've heard many scientific 'truths' over the years... but of course you are willing to take the most basic ones on faith. For example, you believe in the Evolution theory, correct? That man evolved from apes, which had previously evolved ultimately from microbes in some primordial soup, that got hit by lightning or something, right? Seems to me, you're taking that on faith my friend, unless you happen to be privy to the existence of a 'missing link'? Perhaps you can explain why Evolution seems to have suddenly halted, and we don't see apes and monkeys that are half-way to human wandering around today?

What about the one about how nothing can go faster than the speed of light? Fact is, there have been recent experiments that accelerated particles beyond the speed of light. Huh. So much for Truth, eh? Apparently, Science is just so much conjecture that one "believes" in until something better comes along. You may not like it, but Science is as much a faith-based religion as Christianity.

That whole diatribe is of course off-topic for the thread, and I must apologize for allowing myself to be Trolled. I think 'tolerance' of others and their beliefs is fine. I think that forcing the majority to accept deviance as a norm is not fine. The practice of the majority rule is what is called Democracy, and of course bears no resemblance whatsoever to our daily lives. That, I think, is also not fine.

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seep

ROFL

Science isn't a body of unquestionable knowledge accepted by faith, it's the set of theories that best fit the facts we have available. If you don't have evidence for something, or there is evidence to the contrary, you reject it: that's the opposite of faith, period, and anybody who says different is just trying to equivocate.

The main difference between science and faith is that that science is probably at least mostly true, whereas faith is always false (but nobody wakes up and gets with the program).

Suave

Ah, the classic debate between the scientific and religious extremists. Always a pleasure to see.

seep, if religious faith is always false, would you care to give me proof that of that falsity?

JustDis, science is not supposed to be regarded as absolute "fact", and it is not "truth" either, whatever might be thought by science fanboys. Science is the best explanations and descriptions we can come up with at the time for material phenomena. The term "fact" is used to describe well-established scientific laws or theories only for lack of a better term in common use.

Religion and science are two completely autonomous aspects of our lives. Science explains what it can, and religion postulates what science cannot. The very reason that religion still exists, and in as many forms as it does, is that it is completely unprovable, in either its truth or its falsity.

spindles

The difficulty with the theory of evolution, and the reason I think there is so much argument, is that, because of its size, most people don't have a freaking clue exactly what it is. The theory of Evolution as written by Darwin bears little resemblence to the theory of evolution accepted today. This is far from my area of expertise, but any thinking person should not be surprised that science has moved on since Origin of the Species was originally written. It has also branched into areas that Darwin never even thought of...

Scientists believe it is the best answer for the evidence that is available - it does not require faith to see that the evidence (i.e. fossils) DOES exist.

Sorry that we are moving away from the original topic

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seep

As you point out, it's unfalsifiable. To me, looking out my window at night and seeing stars in the sky that are millions of light years away is enough for me to have no serious doubt that the universe must be at least millions of years old. But hey, some people don't buy it. Whatever. Just don't ask me to take their point of view seriously.

Non Judeo-Christian religions don't seem to have the same fervent obsession with "faith" per se, which is a plus even if I don't accept their beliefs.

Selection

gotta hate religions =\ they trap your .."freeness" and makes you think what they want you to think / believe >_>