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Originally Posted by TheBig3KilledMyRainDog
To be honest this was something from back in my college days, so i'm going to need to go find it again. Contrary to popular belief, I don't have all my gethered knowledge at my finger tips.
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No problem. I'd like to read something about that if you get the chance though, sounds fascinating to tell you the truth.
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Originally Posted by TheBig3KilledMyRainDog
Your second point is fairly well played, but we're going to get back into word play here.
If we're going to take Hitlers failed religion (it never really caught on) as "religion." We're going to have to make some huge steps.
Firstly, that religion would now include not just the three world religions and possibly the lesser, remote ones but anyone who claims to be Christ. You can't pick and choose, so now we're going to have to include homeless people, Tom Cruise, anything really.
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What are these "three world religions" you're referring to? There are certainly more than three world religions out there. And why does something have to have a global presence to count as a religion?
As far as what counts as a religion, I'd go with something along the lines of the dictionary.com definition:
a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
Basically anything that fits that definition is something I'd describe as a religion. It's irrelevant if it's practiced by only 15 people in some remote mountain village or if it has a couple billion adherents around the globe, it's still a religion.
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Originally Posted by TheBig3KilledMyRainDog
And then we're going to have to look at how we want to define this use of religion. Because we'd have to agree that hitlers church was just his ideas reinforced as he was now they ultimate being.
religion doesn't seem to work that way.
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Sure it does. How do you think the pyramids got built? How do you think the Catholic church exerted so much power over Europe for so many centuries?
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Originally Posted by TheBig3KilledMyRainDog
Because atheists are generally more keep-to-themselves, non-grouped creatures, it would be hard to blame them for much since they don't operate in groups.
The religious however do, and its easier to target them because their a unified front.
This almost lends itself to my point, that because their easier to target, they are more often target. I don't know under what situation outside of the O'Reilly factor would atheists be balmmed for anything now that Jerry falwells dead.
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Are you kidding me? Ever notice how often people like to throw the word "godless" around in the direction of people they don't like?
Do you mind if I ask you a personal question? Have you lived in Massachusetts or that general area your whole life? I bring this up because I myself grew up in Mass. and it wasn't until I spent time living in the south and in the midwest that discovered how crazy people in the US can be about their religion and how hostile they can be to non-believers. Up in the northeast people are by-and-large pretty low-key about it, they generally don't try to push their religion down your throat and you never really hear the word "atheist" used with revulsion. That is not the norm throughout the the country though. There's a reason why none of the big wigs in Washington are self-identified atheists. They'd never get elected if they were.