I’m with Sam Harris on this one. Bad ideas need to be criticized. All other subpar ideas receive appropriate criticism, religion should get no free pass.

Nonsense, anyone is allowed to criticize anyone for any reason. At least in most parts of the world. Race, if it even exists, is a natural human condition and does no harm to anyone. Religion however is a contrived idea and does immense harm all over the world.

Not a fan of atheists using atheism to justify clear Islamaphobia. Seen that a lot. Atheism is a personal choice. I respect all religious belief, I just don’t want it in public spaces and taught in schools without objectivity. If people are religious they can go to temples. They don’t have to go around eroding all our rights and inserting themselves into government. Keep religion personal!

Hell no. Anti-theism isn’t a proposition to erase or become tyrannical against Theists. That’s just psychopathic, period. Anti-theism is the rejection of theism even in the hypothetical existence of the Theist god, as in “I would not worship a celestial dictator”. That’s it.

All ideas should be challenged. Any statement made with certitude, whether it is religious or non-religious, political or philosophical is open to debate. Many of the atheistic views from contributors at this site are delivered with the zeal of evangelism, i.e. no substance to support the claims, or misinformed positions, declaring an 'I know best' refrain. Debate and discussion opens the way for new ideas and any entrenched beliefs are destined to fail due to the advances made with science and philosophical discourse.

NO idea is beyond criticism. Religions explicitly try to set themselves up as a category apart from all others, claiming that they aren't even ideas, but rather revelations from a divine source, and thus immune to criticism. Yet, if you notice, each religion criticizes all other religions. Religion cannot logically plead a special immunity.

There's no special exemption for any category of thought. Religion is as open to critique as any other. Atheism or antitheism is not bigotry, it's simply an opinion. A religion is not something inborn to a person, like skin color, it's acquired and can be shed just as easily.This is just another of the religions' ploys to give themselves a special exemption.

I'm not an anti-theist, but as a nullifidian I loathe all organized religions, most notably the Abrahamic faiths. I don't hate adherents, I hate the doctrines, dogmas and demands their faiths espouse. If there is a supreme being, none of the world's religious leaders or so-called prophets have a clue as to its attributes, despite their egotistical proclamations. What gives any man or woman the right to claim to be a mouthpiece for the divine? In this realm Rabbis, Priests, Imams and Buddhist monks are on equally specious footing.

I literally seethe with every fiber in my being when I consider what has been perpetrated--and continues to be done--in the name of religion. And I agree with Richard Dawkins that to force upon the minds of innocent children these unfounded and hideous articles of faith represents a form of child abuse. And yes, we may think it's cute now to tell toddlers that there is a Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus, but someday we will look back somewhat shamefully and ask ourselves what made us think it was okay to fuck with our kid's heads like that! Away with all magical thinking, and to 'hell' with religious teaching and all organized religion!

My point of view is valid yours isn't therefore you are a racist .... Laziest argument ever !!!!!!!

Religions have a very unpleasant habit of trying, usually in their very definition, to set themselves up as beyond criticism, and demanding special status to put forward deeply unpleasant ideas which in any other context we would regard as unacceptable in ordinary discourse.

Whenever they gain any measure of secular power, that typically seems to get backed up with explicit censorship, intimidation, and outright violence to suppress critics who call out the intolerance and bigotry.

Religions are ideology, not races. Therefore, criticizing religion is not racist.

People can choose, change, reject their religion, but do not get that option when it comes to race. Therefore, comparing the two is spurious.

I think there is a time and a place for these things. If someone else opens the conversation on the subject of religion, then I feel fine interjecting a few anti-religious arguments and questions. But it is a fine line between bothering people with unwanted debate, which is not cool, and letting bad attitudes pass uncriticised.

Criticizing religion and other bad ideas is great, although should be done with some diplomacy.

I just posted how an aggressive atheist friend was pretty antagonistic with a stranger who is religious and a Trump supporter at a wine tasting tonight. I like my buddy a lot and it was obvious the table as a whole thinks Trump is stupid so I didn't try to curb my buddy.

There's still an enormous difference between criticizing a thought or giving factual criticism of religion v attacking the religious person.

Yes, of course it's acceptable to debate religious ideas. For too long, social programming has built up this idea that religion automatically commands "respect" and that thou shalt not discuss anyone else's "beliefs". I think that line of thinking has harmed us as a society. My proof is last week the Keebler Elf and Smokey Eye cited Biblical Justification for jailing kids and Americans didn't bat an eyelash. That should never be acceptable in our modern world.

If you treated a person harshly just because they were a theist, then I'd say that it is similar to racism. If you didn't hire a highly qualified person for a job solely because they believed in God or attacked someone minding their own while holding a bible.. basically any act of hatred on an innocent just because they believed in God, then I'd say that's right up there with racism.

Luckily, most agnostics and atheists don't care enough about not believing in God to act out on their distaste in a harmful fashion. Challenging religious beliefs isn't racist. Any belief or knowledge we have is open to criticism, and should be challenged in the same fashion as it. If a theist is having a calm back and forth discussion, do the same. If a theist is trying to physically beat the belief of God into you, punch them in the fucking face. If someone gets offended by non-hateful criticism though, then they are probably insecure with their belief.

Antitheism is not akin to racism, no matter hiw theists try to paint that picture. Participation in a religion is entirely based on choice, and any person within a religion has every right to desist from practice at any point in time for any reason, but we know that religious groups are guilty of pressuring members of their sects and non-members into conversion and the abuse of coerced practice either usually through psychological means. Race on the other hand is not a matter of choice and hatred expressed towards a member of a marginalized racial community is an afront to that particular person and violates the principle of human rights that we uphold as a part of any well developed humanitarian society. Members of religious groups historically have been subject to discrimination, and also can fall victim to the same kind of human rights abuses that members of racial communities do, however there's a distinction to be made between hatred and the fair kind of criticism that results when calling into question the questiinal social and political practices that might emerge among sectarian political communities like the practices that religious communities put into place based on their own interpretation of religious law. These kind of criticisms are fair in the same way we might criticize the governing bodies that make up our political realms since the organization and body politic of religious communities are one in the same, and any religious community that seeks exemption to these criticisms ought to be treated with the same degree of suspicion that we would have for any political body that seeks exemption the same kind of exemption - e.g. the totalitarian regimes that haunted Europe in the 20th century. Racial communities don't form these kind of political bodies and don't ask for these kind of protections, only the kind of protection that guarantees them standing as individual political entities in desert of basic human rights. Now, a member of a religious community has that and should have that, and this protects this person from the same kind of discrimination that might be felt by a member of a racial community, but we don't invent special laws that give privileges to members of one racial community and not another, and if we did then that would also be something to call into question, but what religious communities are asking us, people that would like society to be fair and equal, to allow them to receive exemptions from ordinary laws followed by the rest of society on the grounds that they'?re free to practice their religion. They are, after all, free to practice their religion, but that freedom doesn't allow them to reap more freedoms than they would ordinarily receive, especially at the expense of freedoms belonging to non-members of their community.

i think you are misdefining antitheism. being against religion is not the same thing as hating or discriminating against religionists. protecting yourself from their discriminating against you is no more equivalent to racism than being black and objecting to being shot dead for no reason by a racist policeman would make you racist.

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Religion and racism are both founded upon ignorance. Neither have any basis in science or fact, and both are founded in lack of knowledge.

Incredible claims require incredible evidence. Neither religion nor racism has any evidence. To me that means both need fervent ridicule to highlight their idiotic claims.

No anti-theism opposes a belief system not people. Even though people can and do identify with their religions and take any criticism of their beliefs as attacks on their characters, its not. In fact it demonstrates how pathetic people are that they see themselves as a mindless follower of a cult rather than as an individual.

Anti-theists don't hate religious people; they want to free them from superstition and ignorance.

The Dead Sea Scrolls prove that Pre-Christian Jews were debating their own religious beliefs. A pesher is a commentary on scriptural interpretation. The Habbakuk Pesher is the most famous one included in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Christianity would not exist without this type of debate. Jesus (who never actually claimed he was God) argued for this type of reinterpretation. Sufism which is a Mystic form of Islam would also not exist. So debating religious ideas is not only right, it's essential to spiritual growth, and human understanding.

"You can be religious or non religious, but you are not allowed to criticize people that are different to you as it is a form of racism (or discrimination similar to racism)"

I would say that not only is that wrong, it is inverted.
Dogmaticly speaking, religion by religion, non belief in said religious claims tend to make the outsider the minority and the one discriminated against.
If you don't believe, you burn in hell (for instance)

This is the Dogma of various faiths and denominations claiming "Only my religious Tribe is correct"( with a few exceptions), others not of my tribe are lesser, unsaved, sinful, infidels and so forth. That is the very process of de-humanization, the bedrock of Bigotry.

This religious discrimination is so ingrained it is evidenced in clothing and jewelry. Few believers, sporting a new gold cross, ever stop to think that is a Dogmatic Insult to all Jews. Their personal statement of "I believe in Christ" communicated by that simple cross also says "The jews have it wrong" or worse "The Jews killed Jesus". Not all Dogmas are compassionate.

Your opening statement shows the lack of clarity found in many believers. I can criticize your ideas or beliefs, and that it not a criticism of you personally. You are not your worldview.
You believe something I cannot believe, and I am just sharing the why of that with you.

Not responding or talking about religious beliefs let them speak with a bullhorn in a silent auditorium.
As a Minority in society, in order to survive, we must shout like Hortons Who's "We are here, We are here, We are here!"

Racism is blind and generally meaningless bigotry based on ignorance.

Anti-theists can be extremely annoying and even counter productive but being intolerant of bad ideas is bigotry with at least some rational thought, although IME some anti-theists are just over-reacting based on their pain from religion. I get that, I was that very angry, immature anti-theist for about a year.

No.

No.