All religious people deserve to get loled at, since there is absolute and irrefutable proof that god doesn't exist:

I'm cool with people being outspoken either way, as long as it's peaceful.

I have problems with people lumping me in a group in a way that misrepresents me, and with using beliefs not based in evidence to justify prohibition of voluntary human behavior.

Anarchist,

If you think religious reasons were the sole (or even driving) factor behind "outlawing online poker," then you are mistaken.

Is anybody's favorite character not Omar? Seems that if you're a 20something male who picks an alternate fave character something's wrong with you.

God doesn't care about shortened seasons. AFAIK Labron has 0 legitimate rangz under God's watch.

tell me more

fixed

Yeah, religion wasn't in the rationale.

We can get meta with how religion is abused in certain sub-cultures to lay the foundation for people to submit to politicians who lay down immoral policy, but that's a different discussion for another thread, certainly in another forum.

That's like picking my favorite Radiohead song, there's too many great ones to choose from.

I think the burden of proof is on you to make the claim religion was a factor of significance. Not saying it definitely wasn't, but I'd rather you tell us more.

+1 to my few experiences with Mormons but on a personal level, I corroborate with this even more so for the families I grew up with and around in our Catholic parish community.

I mean, all my experiences on the whole have been very positive. I hope that's not atypical, because our parish was (and still is, afaik) full of genuine, well intentioned salt-of-the-earth types who get involved in great community initiatives and are just all around good people.

You clearly don't need a code of faith to be a good person who makes a positive impact; I just don't think those who do practice are this inherently evil threat to society that the vocal segment of detractors make us out to be. I don't agree with everything propagated by the Church but I don't think I was adversely affected by my upbringing. Maybe the fact that I see my Catholicism as a cultural nuance more than anything helps my perspective, I dunno.

This goes without saying. I wish people would also understand there are a lot of us who feel this way too. The sweeping generalizations cut the deepest, by far.

Follow the money.

Unless they believe the earth is like 5000 years old. I can't help but troll the **** out of that one

retort:

Maybe it's because I spend more time with them these days but anti religious people are often times just as annoying as super religious people. If you slip a religion joke into random conversations then you suck as a person.

uhh what? it's teh same people who think god hates teh gays who also think god hates gamboooling

My favourite religious joke of all time, passed down to me by my grandfather (who was a former boxer):

A Catholic Priest and a Rabbi go to the fights on a Friday night. Before the first fight of the night, one of the boxers kneels in the corner and signs himself with the cross.

The Rabbi leans over to the Priest and asks "Father, what does that mean?"

The Priest replies "It doesn't mean a damn thing if the kid can't fight."

But yeah, malicious no-point jokes kinda suck.

When members of our community ask for the mods to ban politarding, this is why.

This post doesn't offer anything constructive to the discussion whatsoever.

I don't disagree that "religious people who do stuff like shut down online poker are like a million times worse than loud atheists" but you're implying that there's a significant connection between those religious people's religion and shutting down online poker like there is with preventing gay marriage or wanting Roe v. Wade overturned. Just an odd example.

Televangelists are awful, awful people.

Houston is infested with these crooks. Kerry Shook, Joel Osteen. Utter scam artists. When you buy an arena and sell yourself as religious but slap a giant sign on the building that is your ****ing name you are a sack of ****.

yeah ok bro

+ a million

Matthew 6:5 "And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full."

Not a big Bible guy by any stretch, but that's my favourite passage by far. I really wish this was emphasized more.

Then again, I'm wearing ashes on my forehead today so who am I to talk. lol.

Religion has been the single most destructive force in human history, and is the primary factor in the vast majority of the worst atrocities ever perpetuated.

Also, it is made up. It is so infuriating when people are somehow treated as morally superior for being religious when really it just reflects a lack of independent thought and reasoning ability.

People oft judge a religion, especially Christianity, by its most obnoxiously vocal members. That's not to say I blame people for doing so: it's the most obvious and readily available evidence.

However, many of the things people find annoying about "Christians" are not elements of the teaching of Christ and are oftentimes even discouraged by the Bible.

Being a Christian is about a spiritual discipleship of Christ. Being "religious" has often taken on a much different meaning in modern society. It's easy to draw comparisons between the Biblical Pharisees (whom Christ often taught against) and the people many of you find offensive.

If bad men didn't have religion available for abuse to evil ends, then they'd find something else. Christianity has historically been a convenient pretext, but is generally not the real driving force behind malicious acts. Our example of online poker prohibition readily shows that.

The nuclear bomb made the end of the world a grim reality, especially during the cold war. Does that mean all science is thus unhelpful and bad? Of course not.

Do note: I just watched the movie Equilibrium last night for the first time. Perhaps that shades my thoughts :-P.

We could use less people on Earth tbh.

Sad to say religion will decline as human prosperity improves.