No body no bones no evidence < not even CSI could do squat even dead dinosaws left bones millions of years, damn 2000 years and they just vanish, if Harrold created heaven and earth, then man, on the 7th day he rested [meaning 7 periods of time not actually 7 24hr days] there are bones to prove dinosaws not like they are just a few thousand years old
A book written by who? I've never seen a signed copy, that begins at the beginning but skips a few hundred million millenia
An unseen entity Harrold that people believe is there, where? in space? in time? in nothingness?
a place somewhere that no one has ever returned from

if i believe in ufo's fairies goblins and ghosts and unicorns i be ridiculed, yet i believe in Harrold thats ok? there is no picture of Harrold either

"Our Father who art in Heaven, Harrold be thy name''

So you run round fukin fairies in the forest, sinning to the max, debauchery on the internet, yet preach easter messages, na, I know two devout christians who are common thieves who stole from their own mother, and another christian sinner who claimed god is a forgiving god and would thus forgive them, Pigs Arse Grass!!

Here Endeth Todays Lesson, god bless you and make his face to shine upon you.

Like I asked, are you willing to parody Islam too??

I'm not sure your premise is actually correct, but I can think of one good reason people are reluctant to mock Islam — people who do have a way of winding up dead.

Hypocrisy is one reason for Western, "enlightened" atheists ridiculing one religion, while giving wide berth to any criticism of the other. It's cool to mock Christianity, and a lot of it is because Christians generally don't fight back.

Branch Davidians?

It's also relevant that at least in the US, it's the Christians out doing the most proselytizing, which is typically what atheists object to most. I haven't encountered many Muslims or Jews knocking on my door.

Move to a predominantly Muslim nation and see how that plays out.

There is nothing wrong with proselytizing as free will allows one to convert or say no thank you.

The issue is the abject hypocrisy of those attacking Christianity but fail to do so with any other religion.

Do those "enlightened" Atheists deride Islam?

Do they mock Paganism?

Do they question Native American religion and the Great Spirit?

Do they critique Judaism? Maybe as that allows for a channeling of anti-Semiticism without being called "racist."

The list is endless as to the useless nature of atheism but their real issue is their hypocrisy. Putting God/theology on a shelf, if you will, does allow for a more objective analysis of a given issue/problem but the vendetta approach of atheists and their willingness to attack Christianity is why they must be dismissed as illegitimate.

Branch Davidians were an unusual and very rare case, of an extremist sect using guns against the government. Statistically it was even smaller, especially when considering their tiny numbers (tinier now, as 90% of them were wiped out during the fire in Waco).

As for religious people knocking on one's door, how often does that happen? Once a year maybe? I get more knocks from people trying to sell me shit.

I still hold to my opinion that hypocrisy is one of the major reasons Christianity gets ridiculed but other beliefs don't, at least in the West. In Asia and Africa, of course, it's a different matter.

We've covered Islam so that doesn't need to be repeated. When mocking becomes a capital crime it should be obvious why it doesn't happen more (although if you look at predominantly Muslim countries that have had secular governments, even that example isn't valid).

But as I said at the start, I don't even think your premise holds up in the first place. There are atheists who do mock all those religions you name. I know plenty of people who dismiss paganism as "woo woo hippie shit." I know plenty of people who have ridiculed ultra-orthodox Jews and the danger they pose to society.

So, no — Christianity is not being uniquely singled out or persecuted. By atheists or anyone else.

A knock on the door is the least of the ways in which Christians proselytize in America. Legal battles over reproductive and LGBTQ rights and book bans in schools are just a few ways in which they are trying to enforce their views on others. If someone responds to that with mockery, I can hardly say I blame them.

Some good examples of atheists at work but too few and far between as the bulk of them will harass Christianity and be crickets elsewhere.

What example can be provided that Christianity and its adherents are actually interfering with LGBTQ "rights?"

Why does a group of people get to be grouped as "LGBTQ" when they are just people? Same goes for racial categories.

If a biological woman is said to be "ugly" then those saying it, if they are male" are labeled as sexist and so forth and if a Trans-Woman is called "ugly" then all kinds of name-calling ending with "phobia" is done but does not address the reality that ugly is ugly. Some Trans-Women are red 🔥 and others are flat dog-ugly. Welcome to life.

PhallicSupermacyOne said:
For real? I mean, gay marriage has only been recognized nationally for less than a decade. Who do you suppose was responsible for that? And what about the Hobby Lobby ruling? That's not specifically about LGBTQ rights but rather about the rights of anyone with a uterus. And now there's proposed legislation to allow medical professionals to refuse to treat patients on the grounds of their "strongly held religious beliefs."

Are those enough examples of how Christians are interfering with the rights of others? I'm sure I could come up with more if you need.

As for the rest of your comments, I suspect the LGBTQ community would be glad to dispense with the label if the rest of society could do the same and just treat them as they would anyone else. Same goes for race. But that's not how it is and you damn well know it.

PS — what were you trying to convey by putting "rights" in quotes like that? Are you one of those people who think writing laws to prevent discrimination on the basis of sexual or gender orientation constitutes some kind of "special protection"?

I brought up the knock on the door because you brought it up first, as a prime example of proselytizing.

Point taken on the legal moves, most of which I detest. But that is in the political arena, in in the political arena even the Mother Earthers are attempting to push us to live their way. I'm paying more for gas and utilities because the paranoid Mother Earthers think that if I drive my car to work, or light my natural gas burner to cook food, I'm killing all life on the planet.

It's a maniacal, paranoia-based take on science, and based more on a neo-pagan ideology than actual reality. There are a lot of different ideologies trying to push their views and practices on the rest of the populace, which want to ban books, ban ideas -- right wing evangelicals do not have a corner on that practice. But thats all political. We're talking just the religion here.

In the US and EU, it's generally Christianity that gets the ridicule, while other major religions (that believe in similar fantastic deities -- read the Bhagavad Gita some time, about the exploits of Krishna -- its as supernatural based as anything in the Bible), they get a pass. Charlie Hebdo was unusual -- but look what happened to them. And one cartoon in Denmark caused an EU-wide, and international ruckus. There were some who supported the cartoon's publication, but it also put a stop to such lampooning of the religious figure in question.

However, if the same periodical had a similar one of the Pope, it would be no great shakes, nothing to see here, move along, "freedom of speech!", all that. On top of that, people would think it was funny.

There is indeed hypocrisy when it comes to how the different religions are treated in the West.

I am one of those people that know full well the creation of a special category of "rights" are unconstitutional.

Forcing licensed physicians to practice medicine against their beliefs violates the very basis of conscientious objector that has been accepted fact for avoiding war + other things for centuries. The bias behind the Ideology rammed out by the LGBTQ activist crowd is that we will all do as we are told or else. A doctor does not do what you want then go to another doctor.

Atheists and others in the West will slam Christianity but they are CRICKETS to Islam, Paganism, and other religions-rank hypocrisy.

Paganism is the Ideology behind the Green Movement but discussing that truth is off-limits, why? The why is that it would show an Ideology to be followed cult-like versus ANY DECISION based on "science."

Well at this point, everyone is just repeating themselves so I don't imagine there's any value to continuing this debate. As I've said, I don't even think your premise is valid and I've pointed out several examples that support the idea. No one has provided anything to refute that other than vague feelings. Don't know what else to say about that. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Okay, I just need to address a couple of things here.

One, there's no such thing as a "creation of a special category of rights." There are simply human rights. Extending them to a previously oppressed group does not constitute creating new rights.

Two, conscientious objector status doesn't automatically mean you don't have to serve. It just means you serve in a non-killing capacity. Not everyone has the option to shop around for a doctor who isn't offended by some fact of their being. In fact, here's part of the oath all doctors take:

"I WILL NOT PERMIT considerations of age, disease or disability, creed, ethnic origin, gender, nationality, political affiliation, race, sexual orientation, social standing, or any other factor to intervene between my duty and my patient"

If a person can't live up to that oath, they should never have become a medical professional in the first place.

The difference between America and the rest of the world is the distinction between Constitutional versus "human rights." You can claim that something is a "human rights" issue but that does not necessarily apply to being Constitutional in America. And yes, the LGBTQ crowd in America wants to carve out special categories of designation so as to get a particular legal benefit not applied to the rest of the citizenry.

No licensed physician can be made to treat a patient just as why would the patient want to be treated by such a physician?

Whether or not Activists want to hear/face this truth the fact is that nowhere near enough research has been done on human sexuality to have licensed physicians practice their version of Frankenstein when it comes to Trans. Gender Dysphoria is a true medical condition but we are the starting gate, still, on how to treat and address it. A person "claiming" to be something means what? Until that "claiming" regimen is applied to Race then it is all a scam. A biological male claiming to be female is the exact same thing as a white person claiming to be black but that approach is flat out unallowed in 2024. Thus, just "claiming" is not the answer to Dysphoria even though Activists will tell you otherwise.

The Constitution has been amended repeatedly over its lifespan for the purpose of closing the gap between human rights and rights as guaranteed by the Constitution. Otherwise slavery would still be legal. Additionally, the federal courts are constantly in the process of defining just what those Constitutional rights are.

Can you describe what these "particular legal benefits not applied to the rest of the citizenry" are?


(Side note: the United States is also a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, so the Constitution is not the be-all and end-all of the obligations the U.S. has taken on. Not that we've ever lived up to that obligation.)

The American Constitution is the sole arbiter of rights in the USA, written for We the People. Signing a treaty can obligate America in various ways but never replaces the US Consitution. Some jurists think that non-USA definitions of "rights" can be applied to cases in American courts but they fail on appeal.

Slavery was removed from the Constitution, as were other things, because of the process of amending it not because of new notions of human rights springing up in the 20th century. Just as the use of "democracy" to describe America but the USA is a Constitutional Republic, thankfully, that may be derived from notions of democracy but is not a democracy. We would do well in America to give more nods to the Six Nations than the blathering about "democracy."

All Hail the Almighty Flying Spaghetti Monster (Sauce Be Upon Him)

That doesn't make sense. What motivation was there for using the process of amending the Constitution other than new notions of human rights? Perhaps it's more accurate to say that the notion of human rights wasn't new but rather who they applied to?

I also notice you conveniently ignore my request that you describe some of these "special rights" you're talking about. Could that be because there aren't any?

Hate Crimes are wholly dependent upon specially created categories of victims. The criminality committed in a "hate crime" is already illegal but an extra sentence or intensity of prosecution is applied for Hate Crimes. This is one example of the special category protection. Another is misgendering and the ramifications of violating that act. Someone calls you by the wrong sex when you look like the opposite sex should not result in any consequences but it does in 2024. There are other examples but these will do for now.

When.you use human rights versus Constitutional rights then you are setting society up for a rolling Arbiter of Rights versus a universal standard applied objectively to all citizens.

Okay, now I get you. I have mixed feelings about hate crime legislation myself but that's a separate issue not all that relevant to your original point. As far as there being any legal ramifications for misgendering a trans person in the way you describe, I'm not aware that any such consequences exist.

But it should be perfectly clear to anyone who's aware of history that there's never been a universal standard of rights that has been applied to all, with or without the Constitution. Even now, women don't have full autonomy over their own bodies.

So, getting back to the point, there's not a Christian around whose being in any way disadvantaged by their religion or being uniquely mocked. It's just not true.

1. Women in America are absolutely in full control of their bodies.

2. Attacks on churches are real, actions designed to attack Christian beliefs are real and those doing the attacking will never do that to Muslims.

Considering that both of those statements are blatantly false, I think we're done.

List how they are false, please.

False? 436 churches in the US have been vandalized or otherwise come under attack, including a black Methodist church in the picture in this article, where the vandals ripped pages out of all the pew Bibles and did other damage. Catholic, Orthodox and other churches have been vandalized, related to those churches' religious stance on abortion and other issues. It's happening -- anything but "blatantly false".

https://www.christianpost.com/news/436-acts-of-hostility-against-us-churches-documented-in-2023.html

The "blatantly false" part is that it never happens to Muslims or their places of worship The only part of the statement that is probably true is that "those doing the attacking will never do that to Muslims." it is probably a completely different mob of thugs. As for "Women in America are absolutely in full control of their bodies", that is becoming less true every day