[photon]

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

But the atheists on this site often resort to links of both cartoons and articles/web sites by leaders within the atheist movement.

So? You seem to have created a false dichotomy of either a) only atheists on this site behave like the atheists on this site or b) all atheists everywhere behave like atheists on this site. Both of which are of course beyond silly, to think that a few dozen people on a hockey website are representative of hundreds of millions of people.

Heck they're not even representative of all the atheists on this website! There have been times when people have said they don't believe in any gods but they don't agree with how some atheists present themselves.

So you are wrong.

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

You can't honestly believe these guys don't represent a large segment of atheistic opinion.

So now you've fallen back to them representing just a large segment of atheistic opinion instead of all. Define large segment.

What you see in the media is a skewed view. The media reports conflict, controversy etc. What gets reported about Christianity in the media? Pastors participating in gay sex, pedophiles, financial scandals, etc. Is that a valid opinion to form of all Christians? Of course not.

They represent a segment of atheists, just like the Christians who think that atheists are evil represent a segment of Christians.

How large it is, who knows. Have anything to support your idea of "large" segment other than it's convenient? The God Delusion sold what, 2 million copies? That represents something in the order of 10% of non-believers in the US, less than 1% of non-believers worldwide.

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

Again the source of these few dozen atheist's arguments are from popular modern atheist thought. They quote and link to guys like Dawkins with regularlity.

So? What's that got to do with saying all atheists believe that religion is the "cause of all the ills in society"?

If someone somewhere makes an point and I consider it and agree with it, you make it sound like it's a bad thing to reference that point. Is it better then to only agree with points that one thinks up one's self? Nonsense.

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

Also what you call information about religion often is just thinly disguised atheistic propaganda. Eliminate the typical comparative religious study course and a couple of faithless "spiritual" authors and you will only discover those negative opinions of religion on hard core atheist sites.

So that you'll find negative opinions on religion on sites that have a negative opinion of religion is somehow shocking? Or meaningful?

Non-believers who don't have a negative opinion of religion aren't going to be making websites about religion now are they.

If someone thinks religion is harmful and cares about it enough, they will be doing things to make their point. It's exactly the same as the Christian who thinks that not-believing is harmful and is out there trying to help people.

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

Besides arguing that a Theist can come to the same negative opinions about religion doesn't negate the observable fact that Atheists are drawn to such baggage. Moreover those commonly held atheistic views of religion affects the rest of their world view.

Except you haven't supported that atheists in general are drawn to a specific view. That you call it "baggage" is just inflammatory and indicative of what you probably really think; that if an atheist does see religion as a negative that's not from any reasoning or observation, it's because they're blinded and can't be correct about anything, because your view of God is right, by definition.

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

So you believe that the Koran itself was the motivation for these Muslim's to commit these murders? Is that what your saying or are you just talking hypothetically?

I'm just talking hypothetically. Religious books are large and complex and open to huge variations of interpretation (as evidenced by the huge variations of beliefs of those that identify themselves as followers of that book).

I'm sure that some Muslims would point to the Koran as justification for their actions, while other Muslims would say they've wrongly interpreted the scripture.

But yes hypothetically, the point wasn't about this incident, the point was that a book that proclaims the mere existence of God is not in itself an ideology.