# "Why do you care what others believe?"



## atlashunter (Mar 18, 2011)

One more reason to care.

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-08-25/world/nigeria.child.witches_1_witches-godwin-orphanage?_s=PM:WORLD



> Pastors in southeast Nigeria claim illness and poverty are caused by witches who bring terrible misfortune to those around them. And those denounced as witches must be cleansed through deliverance or cast out.
> 
> As daylight breaks, and we travel out to the rural villages it becomes apparent the most vulnerable to this stigmatization of witchcraft are children.
> 
> ...


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## 11P&YBOWHUNTER (Mar 18, 2011)

Three less mouths to feed for mom.  Maybe now she can get the meds she needs.


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## stringmusic (Mar 18, 2011)

atlashunter said:


> One more reason to care.
> 
> http://articles.cnn.com/2010-08-25/world/nigeria.child.witches_1_witches-godwin-orphanage?_s=PM:WORLD



According to your worldview, their lives are subjective. How can you say this is a reason to care?


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## stringmusic (Mar 18, 2011)

11P&YBOWHUNTER said:


> Three less mouths to feed for mom.  Maybe now she can get the meds she needs.



Nice.


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## atlashunter (Mar 18, 2011)

stringmusic said:


> According to your worldview, their lives are subjective. How can you say this is a reason to care?



Sorry I don't understand what you are saying. What do you mean "their lives are subjective"?


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## stringmusic (Mar 18, 2011)

atlashunter said:


> Sorry I don't understand what you are saying. What do you mean "their lives are subjective"?



From an atheistic perspective their lives are worth or not worth caring about, whichever one he or she chooses. The atheists' worldview doesnt assert that everyone should care. Everything is relative. So when how can you state the fact that this is "another reason to care"? It might be another reason to care for you, but not everyone, right?


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## atlashunter (Mar 18, 2011)

stringmusic said:


> From an atheistic perspective their lives are worth or not worth caring about, whichever one he or she chooses.



The atheist "perspective" is simply one that lacks a belief in a god due to lack of evidence. How you get from that to the above I don't know but it isn't something I've ever said.




stringmusic said:


> So when how can you state the fact that this is "another reason to care"? It might be another reason to care for you, but not everyone, right?



I don't state as an objective fact. If you care about the well being of others, and I do, then this is a reason to care about what people believe. If it were only a trivial matter without real world consequences it would be different. But for the families ripped apart and children murdered because of this religious nonsense the consequences are very much real.


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## bullethead (Mar 18, 2011)

I remember reading about similar stories that happened here in the USA back in the 1600's. Does Salem ring a bell?


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## 11P&YBOWHUNTER (Mar 18, 2011)

stringmusic said:


> Nice.




Dude, if you only knew of half the stuff I see and hear while working, you would understand why that so easy to say.


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## atlashunter (Dec 14, 2012)

Another reason to care what others believe...

http://news.yahoo.com/texas-man-accused-carving-pentagram-son-194341123.html



> His stepfather told the newspaper that Bartel was "deep into the Old Testament" and may have convoluted some biblical references about Passover, a weeklong Jewish commemoration of the deliverance of the ancient Hebrews from slavery in Egypt that occurs in March or April.
> 
> "If you know about the Old Testament, there's the Passover marks on the door frame (that) were done with a sacrificial lamb, definitely not sacrificial children," John Ponce said.



Hmmm... using the blood of one's innocent son as a passover sacrifice. I wonder how anyone could ever read the bible and get that idea?


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## centerpin fan (Dec 14, 2012)

What is this?  National "Bump An Old Thread" Day?


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## Oconostota (Dec 14, 2012)

Nah - this is yet another Lazarus thread.    Bring that cranky old dead you-know-what back to life, so we can kill him again.


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## drippin' rock (Dec 15, 2012)

Hard to believe such nonsense and ignorance still florishes.  The article says "pastors".  Are they implying that these are Christian leaders accusing children of witchcraft?

BTW Atlas, where do you come up with these 'Bubbles' avatars?  They are priceless!


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## atlashunter (Dec 15, 2012)

drippin' rock said:


> BTW Atlas, where do you come up with these 'Bubbles' avatars?  They are priceless!



I just find em on the internetz.


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## mtnwoman (Dec 15, 2012)

atlashunter said:


> I just find em on the internetz.



I love your little bittle kittehs.

How did they evolve into what they are? lol


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## atlashunter (Dec 15, 2012)

mtnwoman said:


> I love your little bittle kittehs.
> 
> How did they evolve into what they are? lol



Evolve? Pfthtt! What nonsense. Everybody knows the kittehs were made on Khnum's pottery wheel.


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## ted_BSR (Dec 16, 2012)

atlashunter said:


> The atheist "perspective" is simply one that lacks a belief in a god due to lack of evidence. How you get from that to the above I don't know but it isn't something I've ever said.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Why do you care about the well being of others?


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## atlashunter (Dec 16, 2012)

ted_BSR said:


> Why do you care about the well being of others?



Because I am able to empathize and have a preference for less pain and suffering in the world rather than more.


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## gordon 2 (Dec 16, 2012)

atlashunter said:


> Because I am able to empathize and have a preference for less pain and suffering in the world rather than more.



That is about as close to the golden rule as a "fish" can get. See even atheists are spiritual... Wonder if unlike many christians I know, many atheists practice what they preach or are just as saved as anyone else?


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## atlashunter (Dec 16, 2012)

gordon 2 said:


> That is about as close to the golden rule as a "fish" can get. See even atheists are spiritual... Wonder if unlike many christians I know, many atheists practice what they preach or are just as saved as anyone else?



The superstitious don't own title to the golden rule. It stands independent of spiritual belief.


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## ted_BSR (Dec 16, 2012)

atlashunter said:


> The superstitious don't own title to the golden rule. It stands independent of spiritual belief.[/QUOTE]
> 
> Says who?
> 
> I am not doubting that you have empathy Atlas, but where do you think it originates?


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## Artfuldodger (Dec 16, 2012)

As a Christian, i'm appalled that my fellow Christians only care, help, love, and forgive others because of our belief in God & Jesus. I'm glad the Native Americans helped & cared for the pilgrims. Could this be the proof the Mormon's preach about? A nation with morals without the God of Abraham? Impossible.


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## hummdaddy (Dec 16, 2012)

Artfuldodger said:


> As a Christian, i'm appalled that my fellow Christians only care, help, love, and forgive others because of our belief in God & Jesus. I'm glad the Native Americans helped & cared for the pilgrims. Could this be the proof the Mormon's preach about? A nation with morals without the God of Abraham? Impossible.



i know right!!! pilgrims would have starved to death had it not been for those savages(being sarcastic about savages)


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## stringmusic (Dec 17, 2012)

Artfuldodger said:


> As a Christian, i'm appalled that my fellow Christians only care, help, love, and forgive others because of our belief in God & Jesus.



Do you have a better reason?


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## Asath (Dec 22, 2012)

"Do you have a better reason?"  To care? To help and just generally be human? 

It would be easy to phrase -- What is the struggle with the thought?  It is easy to show that caring about the things that actually matter is not related to any religion whatsoever, and is actually antithetical to religion.  Every religion and every denomination demonstrates by their very existence that they do not care about humanity a whit, simply by excluding everyone who fails to see things THEIR way from their own wholly imagined paradise in the sky.  Only a sadistic egomaniac can possibly 'believe' that the vast majority of the humans on this planet need to be 'Saved,' simply by converting to an agreement with themselves.

The first mistake in this line of thinking is in trusting that even if the individual believer doesn't understand the situation, his or her Leaders do, and that those leaders ought to be blindly followed.  The second mistake is the thought that 'Belief' somehow involves a struggle between right and wrong, freedom and oppression, or evil and righteousness.  Look around -- 'believers' of all stripes land on both sides of that so-called 'struggle,' and each and all of them wave their 'Holy Book' in our face to justify themselves.  No sale.  Not for the 'Good Guys,' nor for those they identify as the 'Bad Guys.' Neither have the standing to rule.

The third, and worst mistake, is that believers tend to blindly do what they are told to do, by their 'Leaders,' real or imaginary, without ever questioning the motives or methods.  True freedom, and true morality is not a matter of political expediencies or a matter of faith.  One can believe in anything or in nothing, but true freedom and genuine morality is not subject to the vagaries of politics or religions (two closely inter-twined, almost indistinguishable control mechanisms), but can only be found internally.  Liberty of thought and action is the very opposite of control and ownership, which both religions and politics seek to impose.

Freedom cannot be owned, and it cannot be appropriated, controlled, and directed to the ends of the velvet-voiced 'Leaders' who endlessly cajole innocent folks into servitude to themselves.  Freedom can only be relinquished.  

Seems like that has been accomplished.  I mean, really?  "Do you have a better reason?"

You need a REASON?  

Being a decent human being isn't reason enough?  You want a lollipop and a pat on the head and an eternal promise of bliss to motivate you?  

Sacrificing your own freedom to a singular dogma is an inner death, shackling you to a set of thoughts that are not, nor ever were, your own.  Read some history -- religions and political systems come and go -- they are transitory, short-lived, often stupid, and generally corrupt and greedy.  Morality and the struggle to be free of external control has somehow survived all of that, and it is that sense of freedom and liberty that has been the end of religious and political regimes, time and again -- humanity is stronger than religious imposition, and political imposition, and the simple innate, human, sense of justice has defeated stronger enemies than mere religions.

The better reason is simple:  You already knew what was right.


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## gordon 2 (Dec 22, 2012)

"Why do you care what others believe?"


As the account points out what one believes can get others  oppressed, dehumanized and killed.  There are killer angels in all religious and secular groupings. In our world today these angels of the "developed" nations tend to pervert justice before their taking action for their beliefs. It is a bit more sofisticated that tackling witches at the village level...but it gets the job done easily enough on the grander scale in our post-modern world.


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