Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Nelson on March 27, 2009 at 4:38pm

nope, not me. i just want people to stop trying to legislate their dogma into laws. i want people to think. i don't want religion to be held on this pedestal it's always put on. i want people to realize that they should be able to justify their beliefs when asked to do so and that if they can't then such a belief is likely to inform wrong and even dangerous actions.

but religious people are constitutionally guaranteed the right to their religious belief and i would stand next to them in the fight if someone tried to pass laws prohibiting the free exercise of religion according the dictates of one's conscience. the wall of separation keeps the secular government out of religious affairs just as it keeps religious affairs out of secular government.

now, having said that, would i be upset if i woke up tomorrow and religion was suddenly gone, poof, vanished? absolutely not.

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Permalink Reply by Brandon on March 27, 2009 at 5:00pm

I definitely would NOT. I am very much a believer in personal freedom.

"I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" - Voltaire

Think of it this way.
If you Could ban atheism across the globe... would you?

If it is OK to ban religion then it must be OK to ban atheism or any other way of thinking. If you write it the opposite way and judge your reaction to each version, it is easier to shed bias and get to the principles of the issue.

As far as I'm concerned the world would be a better place without religion. But it would be a far worse place without freedom of thought. As a matter of principle, I absolutely would not take the trade off.

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Permalink Reply by Johnny on March 28, 2009 at 4:42pm

> If you Could ban atheism across the globe... would you?

Here's something interesting, a definite difference between atheists and theists. I truly think most atheists would argue along the lines of everyone's response here, "no banning." Even most of the "militant" atheists would probably argue this way.

If you flip the question though, I'll bet many theists and especially fundamentalists would vote to ban atheism in split-second.

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Permalink Reply by Amanda Mrakovich on May 28, 2012 at 9:19am

I was thinking the exact same thing, if you ask a theist they would ban atheism no if's and's or but's.

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Permalink Reply by Dave G on March 27, 2009 at 5:13pm

Nope. For a couple reasons. One, freedom of thought is important. I may wish people would do some hard thinking and critically analyze their beliefs, but I firmly support their right to believe what they wish. I just don't want them trying to impose their unsupported beliefs on other people, like myself.
Second, banning something just makes people want it more. You can't just declare something is no longer allowed and expect people to go along with it. That worked so well during Prohibition, after all...

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Permalink Reply by River Otter on March 28, 2009 at 3:06pm

I wouldn't ban religion for the same reasons already posted above.

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Permalink Reply by David M. Beyer on March 28, 2009 at 4:21pm

No. People have the right to believe as they wish.

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Permalink Reply by Johnny on March 28, 2009 at 4:34pm

Knee-jerk response is "Yes!"

But upon true reflection, definitely "No."

The key in your question is the term "ban." I think it would be wonderful if some marvelous revelation of insight graced the entire planet and made everyone all at once go "Holy shit! There is no god." But any time you ban something that some people want, you'll have resistance. Ban something that the majority want, and you'll have some kind of revolt. Additionally I think it wrong to deny people their right to choice, even if their choice is disillusioned and deranged (when their choice becomes dangerous to others though, I'll jump on the bandwagon to oppose it).

I'm with Nelson in-that I wish government everywhere would stop using, pushing, enforcing, and even listening to religion. And that governments like ours in the US would put their foot down on people trying to push religion into law and government.

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Permalink Reply by Marc Poulin on May 27, 2012 at 4:06pm

Yeah I wouldn't ban it, but I love the idea of the marvellous revelation of insight. Perhaps some lost letters from the apostles saying they made the whole thing up. But even if science could prove 1000% that there is no God, there would still be some demented people out there who wouldn't believe it.

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Permalink Reply by Mac on March 29, 2009 at 5:42pm

Thank you to all who replied... it is very interesting that this disbelieving hoarde should all stand up for the right to religion. But as many have pointed out - It is not peoples belief that we are really addressing but the right to choice.

I worded the question poorly as it implied that I had some internal struggle with this question. I do not...I concur with all posts here.

Thanks to all for your insight. What is refreshing to see is that there is a commitment to reason and human rights among us and not some mob mentally aimed at destroying faith. This post is a great refutation to one of the classic theist responses as to the "purpose" of atheism, in that we are trying to destroy faith. We just do not want it to influence any aspect of decisions made on our behalf and to prevent belief that impinges on our human rights.

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Permalink Reply by James on March 29, 2009 at 11:18pm

Nope. Everyone else pretty much summed up why pretty well . :)

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Permalink Reply by Larian LeQuella on March 29, 2009 at 11:46pm

As other people have noted, banning religion isn't even a conceivable proposition, and would go against everything I personally stand for. If we don't agree with freedom for even those we despise, do we really agree with it at all?

That said, my sincere wish is that all of humanity will outgrow that security blanket!

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