I'm an atheist...and I can't stand "Atheist TV."

[Archae]

Friend of mine (who is an agnostic,) sent me a URL for "Atheist TV" on Youtube.

I had to shut it off.

I never could watch Madeline Murray O'Hare, because she would go out of her way to be obnoxious, condescending, and dismissive.

And this "Atheist TV" sounds almost exactly like her, in fact they use videos of speeches by her.

"What a way to run a railroad..." -Bugs Bunny

[Atman]

1. I don't believe in Atheist TV.

Just sayin'

[onehandle]

2. That's the problem with an organized religion.

Even a believer can be turned off by their methodology.

[phil89]

3. Except atheism isn't a religion.

It's a lack of belief... Let's get the basics right. Do you think lack of belief in leprechauns is a religion too?

[onehandle]

6. They build buildings, they have gatherings, they have leaders, they have whole channels...

One telethon from being the 700 Club.

[Orrex]

13. Atheism is a religion the way the lack of measles is a disease.

[Logical]

45. You mean like the DNC? nt

[leftyohiolib]

7. if that group gets large enough it would become one

[NuclearDem]

12. Well, a lot of atheists (including myself at times)

have difficulty shedding the old conventions of organized religion. They have their own prophets, holy sites, schisms, and fundamentalists.

[Rex]

34. Right, it is more like a cult. nt.

nt.

[Archae]

5. My biggest problem is with the Fundys.

Fundamentalists from any religion.

All they do is create havoc.

Christian, Judiaism, Muslim, any faith.

[onehandle]

9. Yep. Fundy extremists give belief, or non-belief a bad name. nt

[Tikki]

4. I watched it a bit..seemed fine..mostly the science of evolution..I know how to change a channel...

without issue.

Tikki

[tkmorris]

8. It's a user created Youtube channel

Why would you expect it not to suck? Almost all of them do.

[AgingAmerican]

10. I do not like 'Evangelical Athiests'

I work with one. It consumes him.

[NuclearDem]

11. The only atheist program I view on any regular basis is The Atheist Experience.

Beyond that, I can't stand most of what passes for the atheist movement in this country.

[pokerfan]

33. That's the only one I follow regularly

but yesterday's callers were so unbelievably tedious I almost switched it off. I didn't, hoping the next caller would be better, but they didn't. Still, the Atheist Community of Austin seems like good people and I was already fan of Tracie Harris from her web comic. If I wasn't 1600 miles away I would attend a taping.

The Atheist Experience is produced by the Atheist Community of Austin. The Atheist Community of Austin is organized as a nonprofit educational corporation to develop and support the atheist community, to provide opportunities for socializing and friendship, to promote secular viewpoints, to encourage positive atheist culture, to defend the first amendment principle of state-church separation, to oppose discrimination against atheists and to work with other organizations in pursuit of common goals.

[LeftyMom]

40. I liked Godless Bitches, by the same group, but it's on hiatus until further notice.

I've tried TAE but I can't deal with anything with a call-in format, rambling questions make me want to scream.

[riqster]

14. I don't care for Christian TV channels either.

And yes, I'm a Presbo, so the comparison holds.

[Iggo]

20. LOL..."Presbo".

Never heard that one before. Funny.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

15. Nobody ever had their mind changed

by someone who insults and condescends to them. The problem with this program and the writings of some atheists is that they tend to treat religious people as stupid and superstitious, and that only they (the atheists) have the "correct" knowledge. This approach does not win converts, any more than when someone comes to your door with religious leaflets and tells you that you're going to Hell unless you accept their beliefs.

[yortsed snacilbuper]

24. "they tend to treat religious people as stupid and superstitious"

religious people do that to themselves!

[ChisolmTrailDem]

28. I don't think they're 'stupid'. That is an unfair blanket statement. However,

they are all superstitious.

[Scootaloo]

32. "they tend to treat religious people as stupid and superstitious"

Okay, approach it from our angle.

Here we have this person who beleives that there is an omnipresent, omnipotent entity that lies outside the universe, yet makes up the entire universe.

Despite its pan- and exo-universal scope, this being is solely focused on a single tribe of a single species on a single planet in that universe.

His opening act was to offer the founding members of this tribe a tree of super-fruit that would make them wise and knowledgable, yet threaten to punish them if they ate this fruit. And when they did, he cursed them for eternity.

His next act was to make sure they knew he was still pissed at them for the fruit thing, so he covered the entire planet in water, except for one guy and his family, and their boat carrying every single species of animal on the planet. From aardvark to zorro. This boatload of people and animals eventually landed on the top of a mountain with an elevation of 16,854 feet (11,230 cubits) and completely repopulated the planet in a few years.

Following this is a few thousand years of this pan-universal being getting deeply involved in the local politics of the bronze age near east on planet Earth.

Eventually feeling magnanimous, he decided to forgive the people for that whole fruit thing. But rather than just say "hey, it's cool" he gets a human woman pregnant with himself. She gives birth to this pan-universal being (sounds uncomfortable) who then vanishes for thirty-three years. when he shows up, he spouts some new-age (for the time) rhetoric, then is tortured and killed by the Romans. Then the pan-universal being, having been so sacrificed, goes back home.

And if you believe all that, you are forgiven for that whole "eating the fruit" thing.

Do you know how hard it is to engage someone who holds this as truth, without treating them as stupid and superstitious? it's like trying to engage someone who bases their version of reality around the "plot' of Axe Cop. or talking to juggalos about music. How do you approach someone "respectfully" when they are telling you that we live inside a giant onion, the sky is blue because of magical bird jizz, and that every friday at noon intergalactic whales play poker to decide the weather over Eastern australia?

[el_bryanto]

39. Yes when you put it that way it does sound pretty stupid.

But I suppose that's what happens when you take any world view and simplify it to the point of absurdity.

Bryant

[Jamaal510]

35. Thank you!

"Nobody ever had their mind changed. by someone who insults and condescends to them. The problem with this program and the writings of some atheists is that they tend to treat religious people as stupid and superstitious, and that only they (the atheists) have the "correct" knowledge."


This is exactly what I have been speaking on for a while right here on this site. I'm sick of all the claims from some Atheists that all Christians (or people of faith in general) are incapable of critical thinking, and that religion is "evil". There are plenty of smart and caring people who follow religion. Just look at President Obama, for example. The Mike Huckabees of religion DO NOT represent me or anyone else I know whatsoever. They're just a vocal minority who uses religion as an excuse to push their perverted agendas.
I have no problem with people being Atheists. As far as I'm concerned, people can believe whatever they want! It's no skin off my nose. The problem I have is when people turn vicious about it. These type of people who generalize all people of faith and attack religion are basically the opposite side of the same fundamentalist coin as the religious nuts.

[MindPilot]

37. So in other words...

Atheists need to just sit down and shut up because some people are still unable to discern reality from fiction?

I'm sorry, but my knowledge is not equal to your ignorance.

[alp227]

38. So being gentle and accommodating is the best way to change minds?

Hmm. I wonder how right wing talk radio, for example, is so persuasive. Do the sharp tongues of Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, etc. convince listenesr, or do these hosts' styles cater to an audience wanting to confirm their worldviews?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

46. Yes, in most cases. More honey, less vinegar.

The goal of the right-wing hate radio ranters is not to convert others to their positions but to reinforce and strengthen their listeners' already-existing biases. I don't think listening to Beck or Limbaugh (if I could stand to do that) could ever turn me into a teabagger because they just piss me off. My point is simply that if you want to change peoples' beliefs you don't start out by telling them they are stupid because they will shut you out immediately. There are ways of challenging someone's religious beliefs, and maybe making them think about whether they really should be believed, that don't involve sneering at them as being foolish superstitions. Or, you can just let them be, which is my choice. If someone sincerely believes that when you die you get to be the god of your own planet, why should I care as long as they don't pester me about it? Mormons believe this, and I think it's awfully damn weird and ridiculous; but there's no skin off my butt if they believe it, and I'm not going to waste my time telling them I think their religion is weird and ridiculous because I know my opinion will not change their belief.

[el_bryanto]

16. What are the political implications of this issue?

and if there aren't any why is it in General Discussion?

Bryant

[Archae]

18. We have a secular government, despite all the screaming from the Fundys.

Screaming about a "Christian country," that is.

It's the big-mouth evangelist "leaders" who keep trying to push their version of their faith onto our government.

Atheists can fight back, but not with this condescending attitude some of them have.

[Nye Bevan]

41. What are the political implications of Christmas being just another day?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024113478

And if there aren't any, why did you post it in GD?

[el_bryanto]

42. You are right I shouldn't have posted that.

It was a hot issue on DU at the time but that doesn't excuse it (as I recall I was responding to another post). I don't see the point to deleting it now, but I'll be more careful in the future.

Bryant

[NightWatcher]

17. I thought a benefit of being an atheist was that we didn't have to go to meetings or join clubs

or even deal with the specifics of other non believers. I like to read a little Christopher Hitchens, but that's as far as I go into anything organized.

I'm not a stamp collector, nor do I go to meetings where I discuss my lack of stamps with other noncollectors

[Archae]

19. Hitchens was an asshole.

He was one of Bush's cheerleaders for invading Iraq.

[zappaman]

27. Never liked that old drunk.

Condescending and just wrong on so many issues...

[RadiationTherapy]

31. He was also a brilliant speaker who, I believe, transformed the

atheist/theist conversation altogether through his debates and speaking tours.

[conservaphobe]

21. As an atheist who holds more liberal ideals than conservative ones.

'More Catholic than the Pope' folks get on my last fucking nerve.

[MineralMan]

22. I can't imagine a reason to watch a channel on non-belief.

I've been an atheist since 1965, and I don't consider atheism to be anything, really. Instead, it's just not something.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

43. There you are. You don't believe something; that's not hard to understand.

And of course it's really irritating for one who is not a believer when someone professing some religious faith gets all over you and informs you that you will go to hell or have some other awful consequence if you don't accept their faith; or, much worse, when they try to have their religion incorporated into our legal and political system. The pamphlets and street-corner preachers aren't the problem so much as the religious "lobbyists."

So I understand and agree with what is essentially a defensive stance of "organized" atheism according to which they are trying to keep religion out of our law and politics. I also understand the need to persuade others that being an atheist doesn't mean you are evil, amoral, or otherwise lacking in ethics, and that one does not require belief in a supreme being in order to lead a good life. Where some atheists get my back up is their insistence that their nonbelief is prima facie superior to others' beliefs - an attitude that's surfaced even in this thread. It's that attitude of superiority - I'm better and smarter than you benighted churchgoers because I believe in Science and Facts and you poor dumb bastards believe in something whose existence you can't prove but who you think rules the universe. That's stupid and you're stupid. That attitude is never going to change anyone's minds and it sure won't improve the image of atheists.

Personally, I'd call myself an agnostic - meaning I honestly just don't know. And that doesn't bother me; I don't have to know. But with respect to others' beliefs or their lack of them, I also really don't care. And I truly don't understand why some atheists are so insistent upon demeaning the religious beliefs of others that aren't harming them but that they merely think are stupid. I've always liked what Thomas Jefferson had to say: "The powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg." So, if someone else's religion isn't picking my pocket or breaking my leg, why should I care? And, as you quite reasonably ask, why watch a TV channel about not believing?

[MineralMan]

44. I have no real problem with organizations of atheists.

I'm just not interested in being affiliated with any of them. I'm an open atheist. If asked, I say that I am. I don't, however, spend any time announcing it to people I know in real life.

The result of that is that I've never really had any problem with my atheism. If someone wants to tell me I'm going to Hell, they're welcome to, but they then get to see me laugh out loud at their temerity.

I rarely think about being an atheist, really. I simply don't believe that any sort of supernatural entities or supernatural phenomena exist. Nothing to think about, in a word.

[TexasProgresive]

23. My Madalyn Murray O'Hair story

It's not much but about 5 years before their deaths granddaughter Robin was attending a strings camp at the same time as our son. On the final day of the camp there would be a concert to show off the talented youth. My wife and I are walking behind Madalyn and Jon on our way to the concert hall. We didn't know who they were but the running conversation was so obnoxious that it made me want to slow my steps. ( It was mostly Jon.)

As luck would have it they were seated in our same row. I pointed out to my wife Robin Murray O'Hair in the program and she said they are seated just down the row.

I don't remember much of the conversation they were having, just that it was rude and vulgar (not scatological). I can't remember what instrument Robin played just that she was a nice looking teenager. I don't think our son had any interaction with her so maybe she played cello.

Even though I am a Christian- I am glad that Ms. O'Hair fought to remove religion from public schools.

[MindPilot]

36. I have had several encounter with O'Hair -- all of them unpleasant.

She was always very abrasive, swore like a sailor, and rarely had a kind word for anyone.

And she demanded almost cult-like loyalty from American Atheists members, and frankly some of her followers delivered exactly that.

Although she is largely given credit for getting prayer out of schools, the fact is she just tagged herself to another case and ended up taking credit for it.

Personally I think the Atheist movement is better off without her. (And Chris Hitchens for that matter)

[madokie]

25. Seems to me like watching something like that would defeat the purpose of being an atheist to begin

with. I do not believe in any higher power or religion of any kind. when I die it will be like that bug that hit the windshield, one moment I'm alive the next I'm dead, gone, out of here, however one wants to put it. I'm a lot more comfortable in my belief today than I was back when I was a brainwashed kid and was taught the ways of the Southern Baptist religion.

[Iron Man]

26. I prefer Bill Maher's and Richard Dawkin's discussions on religion.

With that being said, I don't like participating in atheism clubs, organizations, media (e.g. YouTube videos), and the like because I like that I don't have to do anything to be an atheist.

[cui bono]

29. Me neither. I fully expect my TV to pray for me.

And if it can't do that I'll buy a new model.

[yortsed snacilbuper]

30. Anything that keeps religion out of Government I'm for!

Atheist TV showed an interview with a school teacher/politician from N.C. it was a real eye opener, he said he would kill somebody if god told him too!

If you have an inquiring mind, I would recommend that you watch Atheist TV!

I attended the 2012 Reason Rally and hope they hold another one, they show it on Atheist TV!