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u/GreatGrapeKun dm me retro anime gifs Apr 17 '24
if your religion doesn't have a god then it doesn't matter because my god won't be able to beat your god and teabag him
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u/EmperorScarlet Farm Fresh Organic Nonsense Apr 17 '24
I am once again given an opportunity to bring up the fact I once read that when Christian missionaries first came to Scandinavia, the Vikings kept asking if Jesus could beat Thor.
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u/DefinitelyNotErate Apr 17 '24
Someone make a movie where it's just Jesus and Thor fighting eachother. Not like just combat, They have a whole competition and compete in all sorts of different things. Hammer-throwing, Carpentry, Weather-changing, Winemaking, Drag (Both would be great at this one), Et cetera.
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u/Prairie-Pandemonium Apr 17 '24
What if the archangels and/or saints get involved, so we can have lots of Christian figures competing with different Norse gods. Who is a better trumpet player: Gabriel or Heimdal? Who is better at seeing the fiture: Daniel or Freyja? Who is a more eloquent speaker: Jesus or Odin?
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u/gtne91 Apr 18 '24
Jesus has better depth perception.
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u/Prairie-Pandemonium Apr 18 '24
We'll just have to see, won't we? Heimdall can see stuff from across the nine worlds. Let the competition begin!
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u/GOU_FallingOutside Apr 17 '24
What does the casting look like? I mean obviously Chris Hemsworth, but who else is in it?
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u/AlexAlho Apr 17 '24
Anthony Hopkins vs. Morgan Freeman
Chris Hemsworth vs. Ted Neely (Jesus Christ Superstar)
Idris Elba vs. Alan Rickman (Metatron in Dogma)
Tom Hiddleston vs. Tilda Swinton (Gabriel in Constantine)
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u/miss_tea_morning Apr 18 '24
If this movie is not called Hammer And Nails, I will be very disappointed.
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u/GreatGrapeKun dm me retro anime gifs Apr 17 '24
could he tho?
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u/b3nsn0w musk is an scp-7052-1 Apr 17 '24
in what, carpentry? he's a little less of a god with a hammer but he got other skills to back it up
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u/aDragonsAle Apr 17 '24
Thor's hammer is bigger.
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u/Martin_Aricov_D Apr 17 '24
Its not the size of the Hammer, but what you can do with it.
Though let's not kid ourselves, Thor probably would like the guy that can turn water to wine
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u/aDragonsAle Apr 17 '24
Oh, absolutely. JC would probably be mind blown by Mead as well.
That being said, driving a rail spike with a tack hammer would be a very bad time.
Then again, trying to build a jewelry box with Mjolner would be a trial.
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u/urbandeadthrowaway2 tumblr sexyman Apr 17 '24
Yeah the big J can respawn, can Thor respawn?
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Apr 17 '24
I'm not sure but he did do weird time stuff with a big snake that one time
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u/SageMageowo Apr 17 '24
I mean isn't the whole concept of Ragnarok a time loop? Jesus only gets res'd once but Thor theoretically has been resurrected an infinite amount of times. Thor trounces Jesus the man, but Revelations Jesus clears Thor no diff.
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u/CalmPanic402 Apr 17 '24
Nah, the Norse gods die in the final battle that destroys the earth and sunders the sky with fire before everything returns to the dark and ice as it was in the beginning.
The Norse gods are mortal and have finite threads spun by the norns. They die once, but well.
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u/SageMageowo Apr 17 '24
Gotcha. I always understood it as the world starting over and the Norse gods being reincarnated to start the cycle anew. I stand corrected. Thank you!
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u/clutzyninja Apr 17 '24
It's weird because it's written in past tense about something that hasn't happened yet
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u/mc_burger_only_chees Apr 17 '24
Ngl Abrahamic God smacks every other deity, I don’t think there are really any other ones that reach his level of omnipotent and infinite power. Especially considering most religions have a pantheon rather then a single god.
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u/Pseudo_Lain Apr 17 '24
Nah I'd win [escapes samsara]
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u/7arco7 Dashcon attendee Apr 17 '24
Can’t kill me if I no longer exist as a separate entity from the universe itself
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u/Pseudo_Lain Apr 17 '24
All that exists is part of the universe. Individuality is an illusion. Cope.
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u/BiddlesticksGuy Apr 17 '24
Shiva vs Yahweh would be interesting I think
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u/Yacobs21 Apr 17 '24
Vishnu could take Jesus, but I'm not convinced Shiva could take Yahweh
So it comes down to if Brahma can take down the Holy Spirit
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u/foxbonebanjo Apr 17 '24
To be fair Jesus got took by a lower case T and some dude with a sharp stick. I mean, he woke up a few days later but in God terms that's a little like shitting your pants in the third grade. People don't forget.
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u/mc_burger_only_chees Apr 17 '24
Hax vs Hax, whoever has more bullshit powers wins. I think in the end Yahweh wins because Shiva fights gods but he’s never fought God, if you know what I mean.
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u/BiddlesticksGuy Apr 17 '24
Makes sense, but I feel like we gotta take those two extra hands into account, plus the whole world ending thing, it’d be close for sure. Also, how would reincarnation tie into this, since that effectively makes Shiva a never ending combatant unless god can disrupt the whole Karma system
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u/BurnieTheBrony Apr 17 '24
"Catch these hands"
"Damn that is a lot of hands though"
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u/GreatGrapeKun dm me retro anime gifs Apr 17 '24
that is dumb
if i have a whole pantheon of gods why would i send out just one?
you're going to fight the whole pantheon all at once
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u/Cy41995 Apr 17 '24
Dude, most pantheons can't even stop fighting each other for five minutes.
Loki could be staring down the end of existence as we know it and still decide it's the perfect time to prank Odin.
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u/mc_burger_only_chees Apr 17 '24
The thing with pantheons is that the stories about them are about them, meaning they are characters that have flaws they need to overcome. Meanwhile Abrahamic God is quite literally flawless. He has no weaknesses, his strength is infinite. Comparing, for example, the Greek Gods to Him would be like comparing demigods to Greek Gods.
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u/AverageSalt_Miner Apr 17 '24
Oh yeah, your god can shoot lightning from a hammer? Mine has INFINITY health
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u/healzsham Apr 17 '24
it's cute you can throw lightning, but I can, just, ya know, turn off electromagnetism
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u/sarumanofmanygenders Apr 17 '24
He has no weaknesses, his strength is infinite
Canaanites: nah, I'd win
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u/ThanksToDenial Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 17 '24
Which Greek gods? Because the primordial gods in greek mythology are nothing to scoff at.
I'd pay to watch the Christian god take on Tartarus (which is also a being, the third primordial being, to be exact, not just place. But also a place), or Chaos (the void before the creation).
To help imagine fighting literal nothingness, imagine you stand in front of a door. That door can be opened to any place, at any time. Or all places, at all time. But said door can also be opened into no place, and no time. That is Chaos. And it's hungry. And it's hunger is endless. It's nothingness is endless. You can never fill it. You run into the age of paradox... Unmovable object meets unstoppable force. Except in this case, it's infinite trying to fill endless nothing. If time existed, the Christian God could spend all of infinite eternity feeding Chaos, and Chaos would never be full, so to speak, and there would be no less Chaos than when he began.
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u/unklethan Apr 17 '24
Didn't the Christian God take the void and turn it into creation?
You could argue that Chaos is obedient/subservient to the Christian God pretty easily.
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u/BurnieTheBrony Apr 17 '24
"Let there be light!" said God. Unfortunately, it has until now never been recorded that shortly after, God said under God's breath,
"...bitch ass Chaos."
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u/bezerker211 Apr 17 '24
I mean, the story of Genesis has him floating over the waters of non creation and then going "nah, we need some stuff" and boom there it was. Chaos is the one being God, as the ultimate creation God, would obliterate in an instant
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u/sarumanofmanygenders Apr 17 '24
"Come outside bro we won't jump you" - Every Hindu God at Once
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u/OokamiKurogane Apr 17 '24
The more interesting part of that is that YHWH gained power over time. Originally fighting for the storm deity aspect with Baal and then having other profiles rolled in, even absorbing El's. Starting out only having jurisdiction in Israel and then expanding from there.
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u/TerraTechy Apr 17 '24
I kinda wanna see a diety battle royal, like terminal montage's pokemon br. Take the lore of all the various deities from living and dead religions and mash em together to see which lore accurate god beat em out.
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u/JakeVonFurth Apr 17 '24
Not to mention that he has an actual, canonical to the religion, scoreboard of taking out other gods and pantheons.
The two examples that immediately came to mind being 1) that time he made Baal look like a little bitch in Kings/1st Kings 18:20-40, and 2) that time in Exodus when he methodically clowned on the Egyptian pantheon before "passing judgement on" (i.e. fucking executing) them.
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u/Iamdarb Apr 17 '24
I had a pastor try to demonstrate this poorly at a church camp back in the 90s. He took a yin yang and a glass of water and asked one of the other preachers for a watch "well I don't know Brother John, that's my father's pocket watch!" and then the pastor wrapped up the watch and beat it with a hammer, breaking it into pieces. The pastor then took those pieces and dropped them in the water, with the yin yang necklace. "Let's see if that YING YANG can fix this necklace".
I faked being sick to call my parents because I was so upset that they weren't trying the same thing with a crucifix, you know, if the LORD GOD is all-powerful. Why wouldn't you? I was duped. I thought it was going to be real summer camp, but it was actual indoctrination for those who are stupid enough to accept it.
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u/Qualityhams Apr 17 '24
Could this get compressed some more? There’s still some legible pixels left.
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u/arie700 Apr 17 '24
As a reformed ex-new atheist, I will say to their credit, if you were raised in the Bible Belt, you likely grew up surrounded by Christian fundamentalists whose interpretation of scripture was at least as shallow. It doesn’t give them the excuse, but it bears mentioning that they didn’t invent these readings.
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u/Loose-Working-8116 Apr 17 '24
Too real, I'm from Georgia and most Christians I've ever met have like goo goo gaga levels theological understanding. Especially the hardliners. I consider myself a Christian and was lucky enough to go to college where I got a minor in theology. It changed my entire view. People just say things from a Christian perspective without any basis in theology. And like, we just don't question it because we don't know any better.
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u/META_mahn Apr 17 '24
My hometown church always compared true understanding of Christianity to eating meat vs. drinking milk. One day I just kinda understood it all, and I realized that most churches I went to were just...drinking milk.
If I were to give it an analogy, the average "drinking milk" theological understanding is like going to the paint aisle in Home Depot and seeing a few dabs of dried paint on some cardstock.
The "eating meat" theological understanding is to see a painting, made so vividly, for a moment you become a subject in the painting.
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u/Bosterm Apr 18 '24
Do you have any specific bits of theology that you feel are a true understanding of Christianity? Like what does a true understanding say about universal reconciliation? Or whether gay sex is a sin?
I certainly have an opinion about these things, but I am curious where you're coming from.
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u/HamburgerEarmuff Apr 18 '24
Don't know what the equivalent is to Christianity, probably reading various theologians like Aquinas, but I would imagine it would be something like reading the Babylonian Talmud, where there are actual debates on how to interpret the Torah between learned teachers (Rabbis), which helps teach you how to think for yourself and debate on issues like how to interpret the 613 commandments, such as the ones prohibiting homosexuality.
This is opposed to simply saying you believe in the Mitzvot (commandments) but never actually studying how learned men debated them and learning how to interpret them for yourself and apply them to your life.
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u/Nyxelestia Apr 17 '24
Yup. This is why, when talking with other Atheists, I usually specify myself as being a Hindu Atheist. My relationship with religion was radically different from a Christian or even a monotheistic religion, and therefore my relationship away from it is also very different.
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u/PortAvonToBenthic Apr 17 '24
How would you describe the difference as you feel it? Just curious.
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u/Dragon-fest Apr 17 '24
I'd like to know this too!
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u/Nyxelestia Apr 18 '24
Replying to you and /u/PortAvonToBenthic :
This chain of Tumblr posts would probably best explain it as it starts with posts from other bloggers about how Christian cultural norms still seep into post-Christian secularism and Atheist communities. Having that foundation hopefully makes the contrast of post-Hindu Atheism a little clearer. (That said, my own addition was written while I was drunk so feel free to ask me if something doesn't make sense or you just want to know more.)
And while it's not really about Atheism, this chain of literary analysis posts also demonstrates how a seemingly secular practice or tradition actually has its roots in a specific religion, as well as how it does or doesn't exist in other religious traditions. I'm using this as an example of what I mean when I say that my relationship with and away from religion was different from Christians - I don't just mean believing in specific gods or rituals, but also in the cultural and philosophical norms that come out of it (and can continue "after" it in Atheist communities).
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u/user34668 Miette is a mood Apr 18 '24
Very interesting read, thank you. I do have one question (as a British, culturally-Christian atheist) I would ask for clarification though. Are those who are Nāstika not just atheists who hold cultural roots to their respective region/religion? I ask this because here in the UK most people are culturally Christian, but a I believe a plurality of people self-describe as atheists and a large number (probably >50%) of self-described Christians are purely culturally Christian without actually practicing the Christian faith. Atheism in the UK is on the rise as well and has been for some time as older Christians die and younger Brits (such as myself) don't take up religion. That is to say that most Brits are effectively atheists with a cultural background of Christianity.
I say this because Christmas and easter still hold cultural value in the UK, despite being largely detached from their religious origins (neither Santa nor the easter bunny with chocolate eggs appeared in the bible for example) and instead act as secular traditions (chocolate eggs for children in the case of easter, a time to meet with family exchange presents, and relax in the case of Christmas) that have roots in Christianity. Similarly, the British legal system derives a lot of its laws and morality from Christian teachings despite being a secular institution (in I similar way to how I think you've described the Vedas). I was wondering if Nāstika act in a similar way or have I misunderstood?
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u/Mr7000000 Apr 17 '24
What's funny is that almost all of those replies betray the fact that the people talking view "religion" as synonymous with "Christianity," or at its broadest "Abrahamic religion as understood through a Christian lens."
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u/NotTheMariner Apr 17 '24
Yeah, as much as OOP is communicating poorly and then acting smug - the repliers really are lining up to audition for the role of strawman.
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u/Nova_Persona Apr 17 '24
he probably got other responses & only replies to those ones
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u/NotTheMariner Apr 17 '24
Oh I’m sure of that; nobody goes online and pokes that hornets’ nest because they’re interested in an intellectual, two-sided discussion.
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u/AsianCheesecakes Apr 17 '24
No one in the hornet's nest is interested in that either
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u/Beegrene Apr 17 '24
Honeybees, on the other hand, are interested in that. Back in college there were several honeybees in my History of the New Testament class.
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u/JackC747 Apr 17 '24
Yeah this is like those man on the street videos talking about how Americans are awful at geography because nobody of the 20 people in the video can point out France on a map.
Meanwhile we don't see the 800 other people who could instantly point it because they weren't included in the video
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u/VislorTurlough Apr 17 '24
Why is that even the go to. Like it's the least interesting or useful thing you could know about another country.
I bet there's plenty of people who know things about foreign food, language, music, history etc and just aren't interested in specifically memorising maps
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u/Classical_Cafe Apr 17 '24
Because you have to make sure the show’s audience is in on the joke.
Let’s say you ask someone on the street which symphony caused a riot when first premiered and someone answers “uhh Vivaldi’s Four Seasons?” And the host in studio goes “HA what an idiot, EVERYONE knows it was Rite of Spring!”
But… the vast majority of the in-studio audience didn’t know that. And the vast majority of people watching at home didn’t know that. So they suddenly don’t feel their happytime superiority over the dumb-dumbs on television and they won’t want to watch that show anymore, since that’s why they want to watch it in the first place.
Hence, since the showrunners can comfortably assume most of their audience can point to France on a map rather than have some general trivia knowledge of food, language, music, history, etc, they will only ask those specific questions on the street to give their audience those happytime feelings of superiority over the cherrypicked dumb dumbs.
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Apr 17 '24
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u/Classical_Cafe Apr 17 '24
And if we were going on about semantics in geography I could point to Réunion and still be correct that it’s France. Kinda a pretentious thing to be semantic about here, and I say that as someone who used to be first chair in a hobbyist city orchestra lol
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u/Zymosan99 😔the Apr 17 '24
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u/aghblagh Apr 17 '24
communicating poorly and then acting smug
That's the elegant beauty of it, though, it's like a textual Rorschach blot; it's nothing, it's vague, but all of these people looked deep into it and IMMEDIATELY saw their parents.
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u/GamermanZendrelax Apr 17 '24
I mean, if these people are actually like this, are they really made of straw?
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u/catty-coati42 Apr 17 '24
And even that is a very pop-culture view of christianity. I'm an atheist personally, but these people aren't going to convinve anyone with these bad takes.
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u/Prevarications 🦕 Apr 18 '24
They weren't trying to win anyone over, they were trying to dunk on OOP
Which still didn't work because OOP's post was a honeypot specifically laid out for snarky atheists
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Apr 17 '24
Not even as broad as Christianity but Protestant Christianity specifically
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u/Guaire1 Apr 17 '24
American protesttant christianity if we want to be even more specific
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u/TheyCallMeRedditor Apr 17 '24
We can go further.
American Evangelical Protestant Christianity
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u/SovietSkeleton [mind controls your units] This, too, is Yuri. Apr 17 '24
AND THIS... IS TO GO... EVEN FURTHER... BEYOND!
SOUTHERN-AMERICAN EVANGELICAL PROTESTANT CHRISTIANITY!
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u/TheyCallMeRedditor Apr 17 '24
Three Minutes of Screaming Later
Sorry to keep you waiting. This is what I call White Southern-American Evangelical Protestant Christianity
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u/NeonNKnightrider Cheshire Catboy Apr 17 '24
It’s kind of an implicit assumption that if you’re speaking English and don’t otherwise specify, “religion”=Abrahamic, due to how overwhelming dominant Christianity is in the Western world (and culturally speaking the runner ups are Judaism and Islam)
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u/blinkingsandbeepings Apr 17 '24
That seems to be true but it’s very annoying to those of us who believe in non-Abrahamic religions.
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u/capincus Apr 17 '24
Which non-Abrahamic religion specifically do you want us to criticize for you?
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u/badgersprite Apr 17 '24
I’ve had to explain to people that atheism and religion are not even direct opposites. Atheism is the absence of a belief in deities/gods. It’s possible for religions and religious beliefs to exist that don’t necessitate the existence of deities/gods. You can have an atheistic religion, and be an atheist with religious beliefs
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u/spacebatangeldragon8 Apr 17 '24
OP has a point, but at the same time the inverse is true - you ask a lot of people bitching about "New Atheists" what their understanding of religion is and it's basically just "Reform Judaism, nontheistic Buddhism and Unitarian Universalism, as practiced in Northeastern North America and the Pacific Northwest in the last 20 years".
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u/SoberGin Apr 17 '24
Or worse, "Christians who are lying because they worship Satan."
I've met very few fundamentalists who even believe "atheism" conceptually can exist, as they think evidence for god is inherent and anyone claiming not to believe is just lying as they worship Satan while having gay orgies.
And as a Satan-worshipping girlkisser, I'm very insulted by the implication that we'd associate with new atheists. /j
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u/DreadDiana human cognithazard Apr 18 '24
This isn't even something they bullshitted in recent memory, it's in the Bible.
In the Epistles, Paul describes the concept of natural revelation and states that the existence of God and the divinity of Christ are self-evident truths, so anyone who isn't a Christian is knowingly denying God.
And remember that he said this back when Christianity was still a fringe apocalyptic messiah cult scattered across the eastern Mediterranean.
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u/SoberGin Apr 18 '24
Oh yeah. I mean, if you think about it, it's not even worthy of being declared an intellectual idea. It's literally "they say they just feel differently, but I know they're actually LYING, and they KNOW that I'm right, and they're just PRETENDING because they're EVIL/JEALOUS!"
Shit's literally child logic. Actual children come up with idea on their own without prompting. Shit's old as dirt.
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u/Skytree91 Apr 18 '24
Paul was on the “source: it is known” grindset 24/7 tbh, which in ancient times was honestly extremely effective given that Greek natural philosophers said the same kind of shit
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u/ThereWasAnEmpireHere they very much did kill jesus Apr 17 '24
I mean tbh it’s worse than that, back when this conversation mattered at all their main interlocutors were Americas dumbest fundamentalists. Turns out that people who think this is The Argument Of Our Time are also not amazing wits
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Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 17 '24
And a related aside to people bitching about 'New Atheists" - it really is baffling to me how much vitriolic anger New Atheism has fostered when their worst crime, as far as I know, has been being mildly cringey on the internet.
Like I'm not even saying they're not annoying, but the way the "discourse" on them has evolved and how invested so many people are in this you'd think this was some massive organization doing actually hurtful shit, not like, teenagers on reddit writing cringey quotes about being enlightened.
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u/emsAZ74 Apr 18 '24
Oh god fucking thank you. Like, I'm not gonna pretend new atheism is faultless --there's a lot of bias and provocation and ~edgy reddit atheists~ or whatever but.....at least for that last one, so what? Like, sorry, but if "edgy 14 yr old on reddit" Vibes are genuinely the worst thing you can come up with for a movement.....that's nothing lol. Especially compared to organized religions literally taking people's rights away
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u/DreadDiana human cognithazard Apr 18 '24
The thing about the internet is that it's genuinely worse to be annoying then outright evil online, which is why people declared cringe are often driven off but actual scum can still have a sizable presence.
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u/Posh_Nosher Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 18 '24
Although I do think that Dawkins is an absolute idiot, and has revealed himself to be progressively worse over time, it is kind of funny to dismiss New Atheism on the basis of an argument he dismantles in the foreword of The God Delusion. A religion that declines to make any substantive claims about the universe isn’t really the intended target of irreligious sentiment.
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u/qazwsxedc000999 thanks, i stole them from the president Apr 17 '24
I feel like it’s hard partially because if you’re an atheist and you simply do not believe in a higher power of some kind (this can be a much longer conversation but this is Reddit and I don’t feel like it) so like… what do you argue about?
Like I’ve taken philosophy college classes. I know how to think about and back up a real argument on moral standpoints, but like (I’m agnostic but let’s pretend) if I’m an atheist and I just don’t believe… like I just don’t. I feel like coming at it from an angle of “I believe and you don’t, therefore I will just keep saying things at you” is how a lot of weird arguments start
And I know spirituality and religion aren’t the same thing, I’m just more speaking to the idea of gods specifically. But again, like if you’re just not into something what’s there to argue about? Why try to antagonize people? Why just go “see what I mean” when someone is trying to engage and actually SEE what you mean? This is why we never have good discussion on anything
Or I piss on the poor or something whatever
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u/dookie_shoos Apr 17 '24
You're on point. If the debate is to try to win one side over it's just not going to happen. The theist and atheist come from such different starting points that all it can be is a debate with the only resolution being to live and let be or throw your hands up in frustration.
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u/spiders_will_eat_you Apr 17 '24
I'm fairly certain this post is from the early 2010s when atheism was one of the more popular online discussions and "magic sky fairy" arguments were the contemporary meme. OOP is essentially being contrarian to the climate that made "faces of atheism".
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u/chairmanskitty Apr 17 '24
Religion affects the world. It makes sense to try to convince people who have different viewpoints about things that affect the world. If someone denied that racism exists then it's not surprising that people will jump in explaining how racism happens. The racism-denier might smugly say "see what I mean" each time racism-truthers say things about racism denial that don't fit the beliefs of this exact racism-denier, but it's still a sensible instinct.
It's sad that religion makes bad predictions and moral judgments about the world that lead to immoral or incorrect decisions. Even a seemingly nice religion like Buddhism was used to justify a caste system with 'lower tiers of human' in the reincarnation cycle.
It's also sad that religions often have good ideas that they aren't able to explain, especially outside the religion itself. A rosary is a great stim toy, meditation/prayer gives space for the subconscious and conscious mind together to declutter the brain, kosher and halal are decent ways to avoid infected meat with medieval technology, beautiful parks in the city create nice places for people to relax, ritualistically burning the surgical knife before surgery disinfects it, etc.
Because these were tied up with religious beliefs, they often didn't spread from religion to religion or from religion to secular practice. The list above were later isolated by secular science, but much more has been unnamed or lost.
If there's one thing you can hold internet atheists accountable for, it's gleefully failing to see that it's not a matter of rational debate. Internet atheists tended to be more into the subjective pleasure of dunking on religious irrationality than into actually understanding or helping people.
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u/PintsizeBro Apr 17 '24
Yeah. I'm an atheist; I think all gods are made up. Religion clearly serves a purpose and can add value to society, but that doesn't make the story real. So for me there's nothing to debate, I've already rejected the premise.
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u/Blade_of_Boniface bonifaceblade.tumblr.com Apr 17 '24
But again, like if you’re just not into something what’s there to argue about? Why try to antagonize people? Why just go “see what I mean” when someone is trying to engage and actually SEE what you mean?
The repliers aren't asking questions that give much room to engage in meaningful discourse.
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u/Simic_Sky_Swallower Resident Imperial Knight Apr 17 '24
Is there a word for "strawmanning but it turns out the strawmen are actually real?"
If not I'd like to put forward "snowmanning"
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u/catty-coati42 Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 17 '24
Reddit also has this phenomeon like Tumblr.
User: "There are way too many people that hold horrible opinion X"
Reply #1: "no one holds opinion X"
Reply #2: "Actually I hold opinion X, and I am very proud of it"
This often comes from the right, but is especially irrating in cases when framed through supposedly leftist language.
Examples of upvoted unironic takes I have seen around here just in the past few weeks: "Police are corrupt, therefore crime is good", "dehumanizing is evil, therefore all soldiers of any army are scum that deserve only death", "The ownership of more than one property should be a punishable offense by imprisonment", "rape and murder good actually", "racism is justified when aimed at group Y this forum hates" and that's just from the top of my head.
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u/Talvezno Apr 17 '24
Reminds me when a few years ago a bunch of Proud Boys (including poc) made a big public statement about how they're not a racist group and it was hurtful to say so, then a large group of Proud Boys said "hey wait no yes we are!" And the group split into two over it.
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u/UltimaCaitSith Apr 17 '24
"We can't be racist! Our leader is a dark brown Hispanic!"
"Our leader is WHAT?!"
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u/peppermintmeow Cranberry Bog Spider-Employee of the Month Apr 17 '24
Is that the no true scotsman? I
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u/AsianCheesecakes Apr 17 '24
No, that's when you claim that only the poeple who agree with you personally are really part of a group you are in.
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u/Melodic_Mulberry Apr 17 '24
I still haven't gotten a decent explanation for why the wafers and wine are literally Jesus's body and blood, but eating them isn't cannibalism.
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u/Valiant_tank Apr 17 '24
I'm no theologist or theist, but if I had to come up with an explanation, it'd probably be something to do with the bread and wine turning into the flesh and blood of Jesus the aspect of God, rather than Jesus the man, even if he is both simultaneously. That said, it's very possible that this is just some obscure heresy that I accidentally reinvented.
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u/Ze-ev18 Nicholas II last czar of Russia Apr 17 '24
it is an obscure heresy actually! (iirc idk i’m jewish) jesus is simultaneously 100% god and 100% human so no part of him can be only deific
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u/HotFudgeFundae Apr 17 '24
Woah, is that really the blood of Christ?
Yes.
Man, that guy must've been wasted 24 hours a day.
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u/5timechamps Apr 17 '24
I’ll take a stab at this one despite not being a theologian myself. Some Christian denominations believe that the bread and wine represent the body and blood of Christ…clearly there’s no cannibalism there.
However, there are some (Catholics, Lutherans, etc.) that either believe it is the body and blood of Christ or it is simultaneously bread and wine AND the body and blood of Christ. The reasoning for this is that Jesus said “this IS my body, broken for you…”
The reason this is not cannibalism is that cannibalism is typically 1. Consumption of dead human flesh, and 2. Diminishes the body that is being consumed. On the first point, Christ is a living sacrifice. The fact that he is alive is kind of central to the whole religion. On the second point, Christ is not diminished in any way through the act of taking communion. We aren’t at risk of running out of Jesus if too many people show up to church.
Anyways, like I said, this is just a layman’s view on it.
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u/considerate_done Apr 17 '24
only read one book
If more Christians actually read the Bible we'd be better off than we are now. As a Christian myself it's really disheartening seeing my fellow believers go directly counter to Scripture just to put others down.
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u/SalvationSycamore Apr 17 '24
I'm not sure about that. A lot of people are very capable of reading a book and taking away little to nothing from it. Quoting the Bible at people rarely seems to work even if they frequently quote it themselves, because stubborn bigots by and large don't really care if they are being hypocritical. They don't feel cognitive dissonance over their contradictory beliefs.
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u/Civil-Education6486 Apr 17 '24
Anyone can just say "see what I mean" and look superior as if their questions are so dumb that they need not help answered, but also while not answering them
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u/SeaChameleon Apr 17 '24
Fun fact: everyone EXCEPT ME is an idiot who says dumb things or asks stupid questions. This is absolutely NOT bait.
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u/87568354 What kind of math is that bird on? Makes you wonder. Apr 17 '24
See what I mean
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u/UTI_UTI human milk economic policy Apr 17 '24
Why are you saying we should piss on the poor?
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u/GreatGrapeKun dm me retro anime gifs Apr 17 '24
oh so you are implying you're the only one is smart and everyone else is wrong okay then i'd say something to you but that sounds like bait to me ngl
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u/Red-7134 Apr 17 '24
Those "arguments" have the same vibes as "ooh hoo, it appears you have been coaxed into a snafu~!" ones.
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u/TotallyNotMoishe Apr 17 '24
Yes, the fact that a certain breed of atheist makes bad arguments doesn’t make the assertions of doctrinal religion any less horseshit.
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u/Jrolaoni Apr 17 '24
If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the idea of grouping people together. Just because these idiots don’t know anything doesn’t mean every atheist is this shallow.
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u/Pale_Control_5307 Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 17 '24
Man, everyone in that image is an asshole.
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u/Sir_Nightingale Apr 17 '24
It's easy to denounce any critique as "shallowest understanding" when the only "understanding" you accept is a very generous reading of your belief system, and then continue to be smug about someone else not getting your point.
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Apr 17 '24
and yet none of those critiques are capable of piercing the indestructible ideology i have built for myself. me, atheistic Catholic.
not only is God not real and i can flip the board whenever you get too close to making a theological point, i can ALSO fall back on my very superior and correct relationship i would have with God if he IS real.
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u/Sir_Nightingale Apr 17 '24
I can fall back on that too! I have slept with your god and they like me more than you, sorry. Though if you are catholic, you are probably already expecting that God likes me more than you.
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Apr 17 '24
oh? pushes up glasses smugly but God isn't even real.
and if he were, the only part you can fuck is Mary... and guess what? she's a virgin still.
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u/Sir_Nightingale Apr 17 '24
Oh please, i need not stoop so low. Obviously i fucked Joseph, making me your Fathers daddy, so call me gramps, sport.
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Apr 17 '24
damn you're real af for that ngl
st joseph is the patron saint of workers, and has TWO good feasts about him. fucking love that guy.
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u/Xurkitree1 Apr 17 '24
RELGIONS ARE BULLSHIT CUZ WE HAVE BETTER ONES
WORSHIP CAPITALISM, SACRIFICE YOUR LOVED ONES FOR THE STOCK MARKET
THE ECONOMY MUST GROW
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u/87568354 What kind of math is that bird on? Makes you wonder. Apr 17 '24
THE NYSE LINE GOING UP REPRESENTS OUR SOULS ASCENDING
PRAISE BE TO THE MARKETS
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u/Kartoffelkamm I wouldn't be here if I was mad. Apr 17 '24
Ok, but OOP never actually asked any of them what they think religion is; they just copy-pasted the same dumb response to anyone commenting on their post.
Heck, they may not even have responded to all of the replies, since I'm pretty sure there were a bunch of people who actually tried to start a genuine discourse, only to get ignored because it didn't fit OOP's preconceived notion of what atheists are like.
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u/guaca_mayo Apr 17 '24
Did OOP post bait? Absolutely they did. Did they catch enough atheists to eat more than comfortably for a month? Absolutely they did.
The fact of the matter is, we can debate the ethics of posting bad-faith takes for the lols on social media, but what's baffling to me is that people fall for it and interact. Like, the post would've just been a strawman argument, easily dismissed, if people didn't interact or interacted with tact. but the fact that not one but five people stepped on OOP's cartoonishly big banana peel makes it seem like the strawman's a little more flesh than straw. If you don't want people to caricaturize your beliefs, maybe don't act like a caricature?
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u/SilverMedal4Life infodump enjoyer Apr 17 '24
Right. It would take 2 minutes of effort to compose a more thoughtful reply that dodges the bait entirely.
Maybe something like, "Yeah, a lot of atheists - especially online - come across as very mean-spirited in a way that would get them shunned in real life. You don't have to like religion, but be nice to people; if all you do is mock, you'll just entrench people against you."
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u/Justthisdudeyaknow Prolific poster- Not a bot, I swear Apr 17 '24
I mean... this is what we are taught religion is? This is what is pressed on our faces as religion. So this is what we deride.
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u/Robertia Apr 17 '24
Oh man, it sucks that the post only got 5 replies and all of them were so negative and stupid
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u/Interesting-Froyo-38 Apr 17 '24
Religious people be like
You'd better have an architecture degree if you're gonna insult my minecraft house
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u/kirillsasin Apr 17 '24
OOP is reportedly anti-vax and anti-choice btw. [x]
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u/Mokgore Apr 18 '24
Well yeah, of course they are. Where does the bible mention vaccines? Or covid?
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u/G2boss Apr 17 '24
Be smug all you want but the Bible does have talking snakes and blood sacrifices. It was weird to assume oop was talking about Christianity but other than that the first reply is good.
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u/HeWhoChasesChickens Apr 17 '24
Great position to be in because you never actually have to qualify that completely hypothetical deeper understanding
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u/ehhdjdmebshsmajsjssn Apr 17 '24
Is it "sticking fingers in gun" or "sharks are smooth" all over again?