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FoWPlayerDeathOfUS.TDs wrote:

 djones520 wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
What position of power? The director has no power to establish law, grant special favors, etc...

Do you really not see how a school employee is in a position of power over the children at that school?

Not in a 1st Amendment sense regarding religion. Why don't you read it, and explain to me how a teacher can "make a law..." so forth and so on.

The point is, if she can do this, why can't my literature teacher write a book about jesus and force us to read it?

Why couldn't she? You don't have to ascribe to it. You don't have to follow the beliefs. The Amendment is clear. Congress shall make no laws that establish a religion, nor shall they make laws that restrict a persons right to freely practice a religion.

In High School, I was required to read religious text. This was in a public school. The world did not end. I'm still an atheist.

 djones520 wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
What position of power? The director has no power to establish law, grant special favors, etc...

Do you really not see how a school employee is in a position of power over the children at that school?

Not in a 1st Amendment sense regarding religion. Why don't you read it, and explain to me how a teacher can "make a law..." so forth and so on.

Yea, just read the 1st amendment, but don't you dare read anything Jefferson wrote. And ignore all the court cases throughout the years that have addressed religious icons in schools. Just read the 1st.

Yeah, its not like the establishment clause means ANYTHING Please, just type in "seperation of church and state schools" on google and look at the government site.

 RivenSkull wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

Answer this: Yes or no. Does the Koran state the non-Muslims must pay a special tax?

Answer these: Yes or no

Does the Bible condone of mass murder and rape?
Does the Bible support slavery?
Does the Bible support sex slavery?
Does the Bible state that the punishment for disobeying a priest is death?
Does the Bible state that conquered peoples must convert or be killed?

It swings both ways.

I'm not a Christian. I have no idea. I can tell you that Christians don't reference the bible when committing those crimes nearly as often as Muslims, who constantly reference the Koran when committing rape, murder, persecution, sex slavery, and extortion.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

 RivenSkull wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

Answer this: Yes or no. Does the Koran state the non-Muslims must pay a special tax?

Answer these: Yes or no

Does the Bible condone of mass murder and rape?
Does the Bible support slavery?
Does the Bible support sex slavery?
Does the Bible state that the punishment for disobeying a priest is death?
Does the Bible state that conquered peoples must convert or be killed?

It swings both ways.

I'm not a Christian. I have no idea. I can tell you that Christians don't reference the bible when committing those crimes nearly as often as Muslims, who constantly reference the Koran when committing rape, murder, persecution, sex slavery, and extortion.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0669.html

Also, you are stereotyping muslims. Would you like to compare histories worst christians with histories worst muslims?(they are about the same)

 djones520 wrote:

FoWPlayerDeathOfUS.TDs wrote:

 djones520 wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
What position of power? The director has no power to establish law, grant special favors, etc...

Do you really not see how a school employee is in a position of power over the children at that school?

Not in a 1st Amendment sense regarding religion. Why don't you read it, and explain to me how a teacher can "make a law..." so forth and so on.

The point is, if she can do this, why can't my literature teacher write a book about jesus and force us to read it?

Why couldn't she? You don't have to ascribe to it. You don't have to follow the beliefs. The Amendment is clear. Congress shall make no laws that establish a religion, nor shall they make laws that restrict a persons right to freely practice a religion.

In High School, I was required to read religious text. This was in a public school. The world did not end. I'm still an atheist.

And what if your religion prohibits being involved in another religion? Like an (insert religion here) person would be prohibited from singing in a church choir?

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm not a Christian. I have no idea.

You aren't a Muslim either but that never stopped you.

 Ahtman wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm not a Christian. I have no idea.

You aren't a Muslim either but that never stopped you.

 Ahtman wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm not a Christian. I have no idea.

You aren't a Muslim either but that never stopped you.

No, it didn't, because unlike the Christian bible I've read parts of the Koran. What exactly are you claiming?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

FoWPlayerDeathOfUS.TDs wrote:


Also, you are stereotyping muslims. Would you like to compare histories worst christians with histories worst muslims?(they are about the same)

I'm not stereotyping Muslims. I'm accurately describing ISLAM. Religions are IDEAS and as such, are not protected from criticism.

Furthermore, I'm not interested in comparing history's worst Christians with the worst Muslims. I'm far more interested in comparing TODAY'S Christians with TODAY'S Muslims.

 djones520 wrote:
Not in a 1st Amendment sense regarding religion. Why don't you read it, and explain to me how a teacher can "make a law..." so forth and so on.

Clear precedent disagrees with you. School officials promoting their religion has been found to violate the 1st amendment.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 djones520 wrote:
Why couldn't she?

Because that would be a blatant case of the teacher promoting their own religious beliefs?

In High School, I was required to read religious text. This was in a public school. The world did not end. I'm still an atheist.

Why is it so hard to understand the difference between reading a religious text in an academic context (for its literary or historical value) without endorsing it, and a teacher or other school official saying "read about how Christianity is awesome"?

 the shrouded lord wrote:
The point of atheism is dis-illusionment not having your judgment clouded and killing people for disagreeing with you. re-education yes, execution no.

The ‘point’ of atheism is that you’ve come to a conclusion that there isn’t a God or anything beyond the material world. Whatever the individual atheist decides to do with that is up to them.

And we have no idea if this man’s atheism was directly linked to his dispute with his neighbours.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 generalgrog wrote:
Perfect example of religious extremist. Whether it's ISIS, Inquistion, Salem Witch trials, or ultra religious athiests.

Once again, there is nothing at this point to suggest his atheism was related to the murder. People are just making a massive leap from ‘he posted some militant atheist stuff on line’ to ‘his neighbours were religious therefore that’s why he killed them’.

And yes athiesm can be a religion.

It can certainly be a conviction held as strongly as any religion, but it isn’t actually a religion. Really, you’re doing religion a disservice when you keep making this argument.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

FoWPlayerDeathOfUS.TDs wrote:
So she is writing the plot which is roughly outlined as follows. A girl whos name is sinner has a visitor one day named grace. She says that she has a message from god. Temptation(a guy) kills her, and she gets redeemed and goes to heaven.

She has worked on this opera during her work hours. She has gotten a grant from the school board. Students who are part of the chorus work on details during study halls and out of school.

Is this violating seperation of church in state?

I have no idea if it violates church and state. I think you should oppose it on the grounds that it sounds really, really crappy.

 sebster wrote:
And we have no idea if this man’s atheism was directly linked to his dispute with his neighbours.

From an article linked to on the previous page:

Neighbor Samantha Maness, a 25-year-old Durham Technical Community College student, said Hicks was difficult to everyone, regardless of race or religion.

“He was aggressive toward a lot of people in the community,” said Maness, standing outside the building where Hicks lived. “He had equal opportunity anger toward a lot of the residents here.”

Obviously not conclusive proof either way, but it looks more and more like this was a "conventional" murder and religion had little, if anything, to do with it.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm not stereotyping Muslims. I'm accurately describing ISLAM. Religions are IDEAS and as such, are not protected from criticism.

Religions are ideas, but more importantly they complex and changing ideas. As such, trying to criticise any religion by picking out clobber verses and insisting that the faith must put those verses first and foremost, and therefore that faith is evil is a really, really dumb way of going about discussing a religion.

Furthermore, I'm not interested in comparing history's worst Christians with the worst Muslims. I'm far more interested in comparing TODAY'S Christians with TODAY'S Muslims.

And so now once you seem to have accepted, more or less, that both religions have had awesome people and total gaks, then you need to start to realise that maybe other factors are much more important than any religion or the book it is based around. And then you might want to look around the world at the places in which religious violence takes place. Look at Africa and you’ll see both Christian and Muslim violence, and loads more violence in which religion is a cover for underlying political and material ambition.

Start to actually look at the issue and you’ll see no single religion is a constant, and nor is religion as a whole. The constant is poverty and a lack of education.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Peregrine wrote:
From an article linked to on the previous page:

Neighbor Samantha Maness, a 25-year-old Durham Technical Community College student, said Hicks was difficult to everyone, regardless of race or religion.

“He was aggressive toward a lot of people in the community,” said Maness, standing outside the building where Hicks lived. “He had equal opportunity anger toward a lot of the residents here.”

Obviously not conclusive proof either way, but it looks more and more like this was a "conventional" murder and religion had little, if anything, to do with it.

Yeah, I know, that does seem more likely. But for the sake of brevity, and because we don’t have all the information I was happy to go with ‘we have no idea’.

 sebster wrote:
As such, trying to criticise any religion by picking out clobber verses and insisting that the faith must put those verses first and foremost, and therefore that faith is evil is a really, really dumb way of going about discussing a religion.

Would a good way be to ignore verses?

 sebster wrote:
And so now once you seem to have accepted, more or less, that both religions have had awesome people and total gaks, then you need to start to realise that maybe other factors are much more important than any religion or the book it is based around.

I thought that showed there was more important factor to someone that his/her religion.

 sebster wrote:
Start to actually look at the issue and you’ll see no single religion is a constant, and nor is religion as a whole. The constant is poverty and a lack of education.

How convenient would that be! Except religious extremism and religious discrimination has happened and still happens in rich countries, like, say, Saudi Arabia. And some very educated people end up being terrorists that kill themselves up to kill infidels.

 sebster wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm not stereotyping Muslims. I'm accurately describing ISLAM. Religions are IDEAS and as such, are not protected from criticism.

Religions are ideas, but more importantly they complex and changing ideas. As such, trying to criticise any religion by picking out clobber verses and insisting that the faith must put those verses first and foremost, and therefore that faith is evil is a really, really dumb way of going about discussing a religion.

Furthermore, I'm not interested in comparing history's worst Christians with the worst Muslims. I'm far more interested in comparing TODAY'S Christians with TODAY'S Muslims.

And so now once you seem to have accepted, more or less, that both religions have had awesome people and total gaks, then you need to start to realise that maybe other factors are much more important than any religion or the book it is based around. And then you might want to look around the world at the places in which religious violence takes place. Look at Africa and you’ll see both Christian and Muslim violence, and loads more violence in which religion is a cover for underlying political and material ambition.

Start to actually look at the issue and you’ll see no single religion is a constant, and nor is religion as a whole. The constant is poverty and a lack of education.

This would be true if not for the fact that Muslim immigrants to Western countries, 2nd generation, have perpetrated terrorist attacks. The Boston Marathon bombers, the 7/7 bombers in the UK, all of them were 2nd generation immigrants.

The problem is not poverty alone. Poor Jews don't perpetrate these types of attacks in Western countries. Poor Christians don't perpetrate these attacks in Western countries. Poor Hindus don't perpetrate these attacks in Western countries. Poor Buddhists don't perpetrate these attacks in Western countries.

To be clear, I'm not saying that all Muslims are going to commit terrorist attacks. I'm not saying that all Muslims condone violent terrorist attacks. I'm saying that Islam is a contributing factor to violent behaviors that cannot be accounted for by factors such as SES.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm saying that Islam is a contributing factor to violent behaviors that cannot be accounted for by factors such as SES.

How exactly is Islam a "contributing factor" when Christians (and members of other religions) have committed plenty of terrorist attacks?

 Peregrine wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I'm saying that Islam is a contributing factor to violent behaviors that cannot be accounted for by factors such as SES.

How exactly is Islam a "contributing factor" when Christians (and members of other religions) have committed plenty of terrorist attacks?

How does what Christians do have anything to do with Islam as a contributing factor? When was the last time Christians shot up a cartoon studio for publishing cartoons about Jesus? When was the last time Christians blew up a bunch of innocent people for Christian holy war? When was the last time Christians beheaded non-Christians for failing to praise Jesus?

When was the last time poor atheists beheaded anyone for any reason at all, other than being totally insane, and in isolated incidents? The Koran lists beheading as a punishment for apostasy. ISIS didn't get this idea from nowhere - it's in "the good book."

Keep burying your head in the sand though. I expected decent counter-arguments. These are kind of pathetic. You're arguing that Islam plays zero role in Muslims committing suicide bombings, beheadings, and other acts of murder?

... that would mainly be because Western societies are not continuing a program of repression and violence against these non-Muslim communities, from where these 2nd generation immigrants descend. If the US was, say, actively bombing Israel, instead of being its staunchest military ally (while the state of Israel continues its pogrom against the Muslim Palestinians), then you can bet there'd be some Jewish terrorists.

Want to know something funny? The Middle East isn't the largest concentration of Muslims on the planet. That would be the western (from the US' perspective) Pacific Rim. Indonesia and such. Bunch of stuff goes on there, mostly over political issues and resource conflicts between various factions that are generally (but not always) aligned along religious lines... but this does not make such conflicts a religious conflict, as politics and religion closely align for many people.

When was the last time Christians blew up a bunch of innocent people for Christian holy war?

Last few years:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Rudolph
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/06/us/shooting-reported-at-temple-in-wisconsin.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_George_Tiller
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knoxville_Unitarian_Universalist_church_shooting

 Psienesis wrote:
... that would mainly be because Western societies are not continuing a program of repression and violence against these non-Muslim communities, from where these 2nd generation immigrants descend. If the US was, say, actively bombing Israel, instead of being its staunchest military ally (while the state of Israel continues its pogrom against the Muslim Palestinians), then you can bet there'd be some Jewish terrorists.

Want to know something funny? The Middle East isn't the largest concentration of Muslims on the planet. That would be the western (from the US' perspective) Pacific Rim. Indonesia and such. Bunch of stuff goes on there, mostly over political issues and resource conflicts between various factions that are generally (but not always) aligned along religious lines... but this does not make such conflicts a religious conflict, as politics and religion closely align for many people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_Indonesia

Want to know something funnier? Most of the terrorist attacks carried out in Indonesia have been by Muslims. What were you saying again?

Everywhere that Islam borders other religions there is violent conflict of the worst kind; usually involving the brutal murder of innocent women and children. Keep it up though...

That last part was hardly necessary, motyak

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
How convenient would that be! Except religious extremism and religious discrimination has happened and still happens in rich countries, like, say, Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia is kind of a misleading example because it isn't really a rich country. It's a poor country with massive income inequality that just happened to get lucky and exist on top of a lot of valuable oil. So there are a few people at the top with obscene amounts of money, but the country as a whole has more in common with poor countries than with countries like the US.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
How does what Christians do have anything to do with Islam as a contributing factor?

The point is that you can't call Islam a "contributing factor" if people from other religions are guilty of the same crimes. Islam clearly isn't necessary for terrorism, so it doesn't make much sense to single out one religion for responsibility.

When was the last time Christians shot up a cartoon studio for publishing cartoons about Jesus? When was the last time Christians blew up a bunch of innocent people for Christian holy war? When was the last time Christians beheaded non-Christians for failing to praise Jesus?

Why are you narrowing it down to specific kinds of terrorism instead of terrorism in general? Remember how Anders Breivik murdered a bunch of people because of extremist Christian ideology? Remember the Christians who have murdered doctors for providing abortions and cited Christianity as justification for their actions? Remember the Christians in the US claiming that gay people should be killed for their crimes against god?

You're arguing that Islam plays zero role in Muslims committing suicide bombings, beheadings, and other acts of murder?

No, I'm arguing that your "Christians/Jews/etc don't do this therefore it must be Islam" argument is nonsense.

Want to know something funnier? Most of the terrorist attacks carried out in Indonesia have been by Muslims. What were you saying again?

Uh, I said as much. Let me quote myself, since you apparently missed it while thinking yourself clever:

Psienesis wrote: Bunch of stuff goes on there, mostly over political issues and resource conflicts between various factions that are generally (but not always) aligned along religious lines... but this does not make such conflicts a religious conflict, as politics and religion closely align for many people.

 Psienesis wrote:

Want to know something funnier? Most of the terrorist attacks carried out in Indonesia have been by Muslims. What were you saying again?

Uh, I said as much. Let me quote myself, since you apparently missed it while thinking yourself clever:

Psienesis wrote: Bunch of stuff goes on there, mostly over political issues and resource conflicts between various factions that are generally (but not always) aligned along religious lines... but this does not make such conflicts a religious conflict, as politics and religion closely align for many people.

You argue that it's not a religious conflict. I argue that if this were the case, Islam would not be at war with the rest of the world. As it is, it is very much a religious conflict.

Islam isn't at war with the rest of the world. If it was, we'd all be dead.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
Islam would not be at war with the rest of the world.

It isn't.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
To be clear, I'm not saying that all Muslims are going to commit terrorist attacks. I'm not saying that all Muslims condone violent terrorist attacks. I'm saying that Islam is a contributing factor to violent behaviors that cannot be accounted for by factors such as SES.

And there, I sought of agree with you. Within Islam there are extremist wings preaching violence, and these calls are getting heard by middle class kids in wealthy countries. That is certainly an Islamic phenomenon. The point is that you were wrong when you tried to claim that this issue was somehow inherent to Islam, as if it were a feature of the majority of the faith.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:
I argue that if this were the case, Islam would not be at war with the rest of the world.

Oh, so it’s basically just the old ‘clash of cultures’ crap. Wow, massive flashback to 2003.

On the topic of religion in public schools, pocket bibles were handed out at my highschool and someone had a speech with my year level gathered.

Cant remember what the conversation was about but a kid in my class got preachy over something between homegroup and lessons.

Little did he realise, our first lesson for the day was chemistry. Now I may burn an eternity of hell, but his face for the few minutes that pocket bible met the bunsen burner was worth it!

Dropbear Victim wrote:
but his face for the few minutes that pocket bible met the bunsen burner was worth it!

I wasn't being sacreligious! I was just testing the combustibility!

I did a similar thing for a history project once (We were making mock museum displays) and I wanted to make a Bible look old so I figured singe the edges a bit... Let's just say Bibles burned really well. Thin paper and all that.

I am acually considering making a video showing a bible burning nd then a non-fiction book burning, my point being that even if you believe in the bible there should be no difference.
Now, believing in something, and supporting it, are different things. for example, I believe in my school's existance, but do not actively support all of it's rules.
Honestly, if a person fully supports (not believes in) the bible, there is something wrong with them.

 the shrouded lord wrote:
I am acually considering making a video showing a bible burning nd then a non-fiction book burning, my point being that even if you believe in the bible there should be no difference.

The secret is to douse the pages in water first Otherwise the whole thing just goes up like a roman candle. Took me about 2 Bibles to get it right, and probably waaaay more time than the A+ was actually worth, but the effect was effective XD

 LordofHats wrote:

 the shrouded lord wrote:
I am acually considering making a video showing a bible burning nd then a non-fiction book burning, my point being that even if you believe in the bible there should be no difference.

The secret is to douse the pages in water first Otherwise the whole thing just goes up like a roman candle. Took me about 2 Bibles to get it right, and probably waaaay more time than the A+ was actually worth, but the effect was effective XD

I see what you did there!

 the shrouded lord wrote:
I am acually considering making a video showing a bible burning nd then a non-fiction book burning, my point being that even if you believe in the bible there should be no difference.

So you've decided that you want to do something incredibly offensive and provoke people, but you can't even bother to come up with something original?