[Coach]

Originally Posted by Jude

Look, I agree that this man should be removed from his current position as a pillar of the community but the preconception that you have is that religion is twisting these individuals instead of these individuals twisting religion to suit their own personal agendas.

People like Eric Dammann can crop up in any facet of society, whether he's a pastor, a scout leader, peewee coach, at work or in your own family unit. Removing religion won't stop these people from being dicks and yes, in some cases the people around them do nothing to stop it for a plethora of reasons.

The issue (for me) is that religion gives a platform for these types of people to spout their BS, AND that, because they spout said BS under the guise of serving a deity, people following the religion can fall under their influence. And as I said before, even if that's one person, it's a detriment to human progress.

There is also a lot of assumptions going around that somehow your average religious Joe schmoe isn't just as outraged as your average non-religious Joe-schmoe. The only reason why this video has garnered as much attention as it has is because his conduct is NOT the norm in a church setting. Would you lump the actions of the Westboro Baptist Church with all other Christians?

In a way, yes. The top-levels of religions have time and time again either defended or ignored deplorable behaviour in their ranks. The same way that Muslims are being associated with terrorism, the same way Communism is associated with laziness, or capitalism with corruption, or the Oilers with terribleness, Christian's will get associated with their worst aspects as well. Even just living in Calgary gets me associated with being an Oil-pumping anti-environmentalist by many standards. If you don't want the stigma of the club, you can leave the club, or change it. But to stand there while a pastor hits a kid, or a Jihadist takes a life and say "That's not me though!", well, yea it is. You belong to this family or group, You get to be associated with the good and the bad. You can pick and choose what you want to believe of course, but your still unde that umbrella. And until you change, or the umbrella changes, these associations will be made.

If you go to any synagogue, church, or mosque here in Calgary, do you honestly believe that they are promoting child abuse, homophobia and creationism ? If they are then I will happily pick up the anti-religion banner and sharpen my pitchfork with the rest of you guys.

Yes (if you consider the many cases of child abuse within the churches themselves and the subsequent rug-sweeping by the higher-ups), yes (c'mon really? All Christians may not be homophobic, but Christianity itself is. So is Islam. Or, at least, people use them as a reason to be, which is just as bad and really my whole point.) and yes, creationism is a fundamental of Christianity, whther they want to move the target from Earth to the Universe is irrelavent.