We're always being told we should respect other people's beliefs, but....

[Hakluyt]

.....what exactly does "respect" mean in this context? I am an atheist, and I am always happy to be challenged on my lack of belief, and am frequently told that I must have no moral compass and that I have to put up and shut up when Christianity imposes itself on me. I have also been told that I must have no sense of wonder- and, on on particularly memorable occasion, that I couldn't possibly have any charitable impulses!

But if I say anything even remotely "challenging" about faith or people of faith,bi am accused of disrespect. So, what exactly does respecting other people's beliefs mean?

No. I asked about respecting beliefs not people. There is a difference.

Yes, read back on posts by big dorrit, bluestars, cote. No, I don't think disagreeing is the same as insulting. Perhaps you haven't read the insulting posts. Well now's your chance! They go back a few days.

Why don't you respect religious belief?

I mean, the most recent one was by bigbluestars who suggested I had taken too many drugs, but they go back a few days to some of bigdorrit's posts.

Well, you certainly gave as good as you got! Starting off by telling people what they do and don't believe may not have been the best start...

They don't respect alternative views I because it is like a spiritual light shining in the darkness, and it causes great discomfort to a soul that denies light exists.

Bigbluestar was on the Santa thread disclosing she is a practising witch, so if course she would put as much distance between herself and anyone who follows God. There's a spiritual clash if ever there was one!

Hakluyt, combust22, headinhands, BackOnlyBriefly, CotesdAzur, BigDorrit are all evangelistic atheists and regulars on internet religion threads, which just goes to show that they just come to argue and try to disrupt as best they can, because if there is no God then they'd just plonk him in the Santa category and carry on with their lives.

I haven't seen a single religion thread where all of them haven't been rude, and by that I mean scorned and ridiculed someone else, at least once. And that's an understatement.

The likes of
Frustratedbaker and vbfamily for example have been quite the opposite and it is a credit to you to keep your manners when all about you have lost theirs.

"They don't respect alternative views I because it is like a spiritual light shining in the darkness, and it causes great discomfort to a soul that denies light exists."

Now that is the rudest most disrespectful thing anyone has said on this thread!

"I haven't seen a single religion thread where all of them haven't been rude, and by that I mean scorned and ridiculed someone else, at least once. And that's an understatement."

Show me where I have.

"If a scientists believes in God they approach it from the angle of changes with decay over the years that we use to measure something we can't observe or test because we weren't there (radiocarbon dating for example). But if a scientist doesn't believe in God they approach it from the angle of there being no changes with decay rates, and this gives a much older reading."

What this ^ tells me is that you don't know what radioactive decay is.

"Whichever world-view you begin with gives entirely different readings at the end result."

No it doesn't.

It's actually quite shocking that you have presumably gone through the education system of a Western European country and ended up with this notion that the result of an experiment depends on the worldview of the observer.

"They don't respect alternative views I because it is like a spiritual light shining in the darkness, and it causes great discomfort to a soul that denies light exists."

This is actually funny You have no idea, do you? Really and truly cannot even imagine, not for a second, what it might feel like to not have a need to believe in a deity, or souls, or magicked up explanations to give some sort of meaning to your existence.

I respect my friends who are religious because they are human beings deserving respect. I don't respect their beliefs such as transubstantiation because frankly they are absurd. There is no spiritual light shining out of that belief in dry bread physically and literally turning into the flesh of a man who died about 2000 years ago. I'm not convinced that there are any "souls" to be discomforted or otherwise, either. Your sentence above means nothing, I'm afraid, not because I'm discomforted but because it talks about magic stuff that I honestly don't think exists. And I think this because there is no proof, nada, for their existence.

"Hakluyt, combust22, headinhands, BackOnlyBriefly, CotesdAzur, BigDorrit are all evangelistic atheists and regulars on internet religion threads"

I answer questions and talk about my thoughts on this subject on MN (not anywhere else on the internet) and I don't go telling others how and why they must change their ways. That would be evangelical.

"if there is no God then they'd just plonk him in the Santa category and carry on with their lives. "

Err... That is where we are, right now. That category isn't a bad description actually, and I have used the Santa example in the past to explain to DD how and why some people believe there is an invisible being called "God".

I notice how often that people come on threads like this to put the Christian point of view, are questioned and challenged, then accuse people of being mean to them and disappear.

I am troubled by this- I would hate to think that they really feel upset and bullied. But I'm not sure what they expect- which goes back to my original question. Frustratedbqker took exception to her views on science bing challenged- but they are provably wrong. How can that be said without being accused of being nasty- particularly when several people say it simultaneously?

I've just been unexpectedly and unfairly (well, I would say that, wouldn't I?) attacked on another thread and it feels pretty horrible- I don't want to do that to others. But I don't want to leave bullshit unchallenged either.

Google "radiometric dating - Christian perspective". Enjoy.

There's an hour of my life i'll never get back, let alone the one spent catching up on this thread this morning.

I've had the discussion before on here about C14 dating, but that was with what i thought was one misinformed poster, - i had no idea it was a 'thing'.

Oh,yes. Definitely "a thing". The hoops that YEers jump through to maintain their position is scary.

Actually Hakaluyt, there should have been a semicolon after your name in that sentence. Hakaluyt: combust22, headinhands, BackOnlyBriefly, CotesdAzur, BigDorrit are all evangelistic atheists.....

However, when I read back over your posts I saw the following, which I do think actually removes the semi-colon after all.

You have actually not been too bad on this thread, perhaps because it is your own and about respect so you are trying desperately to toe the line?

However, you still managed to have been tried to put people down by being snippy, superior and sarcastic and name-calling.

---

To Dione - Feel free not to contribute (In other words, bog off).

TO FallenMadonna - some beliefs are bollocks (In reference to her beliefs).

Honeysuckle- a positive army of straw men in your post! (A common atheist favourite one-liner learned in the school or evangelical atheism).

Dione-I do rather wonder who died and made you queen of the internet........

Might it save time and stop the derailing of an interesting discussion if you just list all the questions you want to ask me, Dione? I'll answer them and then we can move on.

I'm not actually asking for etiquette tips. Dione- what is the purpose of your question?

I suspect that ARainyDay is not actually up for any sort of discussion. Despite there being plenty of discussion before, during and after that little nugget.

Then you resort to the usual atheist one-liners like "No true Scotsman........"

SARCASM: Good for you.??I am glad I don't have to jump through that particular hoop. It would make feel like a very dishonest thinker.

SUPERIORITY COMPLEX: Why do you find this so hard to grasp?
RUDE NAME-CALLING: hijacked by loons Young Earth Creationists

SNAPPY: Yes, I know. What is your point?

oops look like I still have a problem hitting the semicolon! Here ya go ;

I can obviously see why it is so important to discredit radiometric dating from a YEC pov, but the misinformation is staggering. In the case of C14 they either must have either come across the fact that results are calibrated to allow for atmospheric fluctutions in carbon ratios and deliberately not included it, or do not know the subject well enough to understand it. It is pretty basic, fundamental stuff, yet there is zero mention of this on any of the creationist sites, because they can't then accuse scientists of ignoring it.

That should have been fluctuations btw - no idea what a fluctution is!

Nope

Did you look at the posts Dione made that I was responding to in most of the quotations you posted, Pickled in a Jar?

And if an argument is a straw man, or a no true Scotsman are we not allowed to point it out?

And does anyone apart from YECs think they are anything but loons?

Can't remember when or in response to what I said the other things but they seem pretty mild to me!