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What Does Atheism Really Threaten? Humanity or Insecure Theists?
- Thread starter Sunstone
- Start date
What would be a threat would be atheism with no morality. Fortunately, I'm not worried about that. Atheists and theists seem to have similar morality.
Iymus
Active Member
Can I answer your question with a question? Is Fatherless households "or lack of male guidance" a genuine threat to humanity? Or is it merely a threat to insecure Men.
My answer is your answer to my question.
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Terry Sampson
Well-Known Member
Color me Not Afraid!
I’m sure there are plenty of fatherless Christian households. What does your question have to do with atheism specifically?
I would argue that a certain percentage of fatherless households are inevitable due to natural causes, and thus it doesn’t make sense to view them as some threat to humanity to be annihilated.
Hard to distinguish between a Stalin and a Torquemada, isn't it? One had no religion, the other had too much. Neither had any real morality.
Iymus
Active Member
as there are probably plenty of households with atheists.
his answer to my question answers his question.
Then perhaps I should rephrase the question to lack of male guidance
Is lack of male guidance a genuine threat to humanity? Or is it merely a threat to insecure Men.
My answer is your answer to my question.
I don’t think lack of male guidance will be a problem in single parent households.
There will still be doctors and non-partner male interactions, male school teachers and other forms of male guidance.
What sort of male guidance do you have in mind that comes from a father that could not come through a mother, a male doctor or some other teacher?
Total non-sequitur.
McBell
Resident Sourpuss
Yeppers.
But at least now he is part of the discussion without actually discussing the topic.
Some people should just get a puppy.
Disagree -- any belief system that is simply wrong is a threat. Check out the many, many cults based on spurious beliefs that left their members dead: like Jonestown, or Heaven's Gate, and so many more.
The belief isn't hurting anyone. A belief is something one has in one's mind. If one acts upon beliefs is a way that is contrary to society that becomes an action. If a person sits in his bedroom and believes everything written in Mein Kampf but never does anything about it, he's not a threat.
I don't find anything threatening about atheism as a belief system or atheists as people. Its a principled, conscientious and rational worldview and I respect those who have come to that philosophical conclusion.
Actually, I often find I have more in common, value-wise and politically, with atheists of a left-liberal leaning persuasion than I do with many of my fellow believers in Christ who are of an extremely conservative or even nationalist / nativist mindset.
In my own British context, I find the reactionary views of Jacob Rees-Mogg (Tory politician, Catholic and an arch-Brexiteer) a million times more threatening than those of AC Grayling (a liberal secular humanist and atheist intellectual, as well as a fellow pro-EU Remainer).
There are so many things that bind people together (and indeed, to the contrary, divide) which transcend one's personal beliefs about the existence, or lack thereof, of a Supreme Being.
It's not a "big" issue for me in evaluating other people (doesn't feature at all actually), nor does it determine in anyway if I view a person as a friend or indeed as an ally in the advocacy of a given cause.
To feel "threatened" by atheism suggests to me some kind of subliminal prejudice or bigotry against the principled rejection of belief in a deity or deities.
What another person believes about religion is none of my business, as St. Paul said: "What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church?" (1 Corinthians 5:12)).
Moreover, the existence of atheism and the evidently high moral conduct of many atheists, could be said - from a Catholic theological point of view at least - to lend credence to St. Paul's conviction, expressed in Romans (derived originally from the Stoics), that there is a natural "law" of some kind written on every human heart through the internal voice of conscience. In this way, I don't find atheism threatening so much as comforting, in what it may be construed to imply about human nature.
Actually, I often find I have more in common, value-wise and politically, with atheists of a left-liberal leaning persuasion than I do with many of my fellow believers in Christ who are of an extremely conservative or even nationalist / nativist mindset.
In my own British context, I find the reactionary views of Jacob Rees-Mogg (Tory politician, Catholic and an arch-Brexiteer) a million times more threatening than those of AC Grayling (a liberal secular humanist and atheist intellectual, as well as a fellow pro-EU Remainer).
There are so many things that bind people together (and indeed, to the contrary, divide) which transcend one's personal beliefs about the existence, or lack thereof, of a Supreme Being.
It's not a "big" issue for me in evaluating other people (doesn't feature at all actually), nor does it determine in anyway if I view a person as a friend or indeed as an ally in the advocacy of a given cause.
To feel "threatened" by atheism suggests to me some kind of subliminal prejudice or bigotry against the principled rejection of belief in a deity or deities.
What another person believes about religion is none of my business, as St. Paul said: "What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church?" (1 Corinthians 5:12)).
Moreover, the existence of atheism and the evidently high moral conduct of many atheists, could be said - from a Catholic theological point of view at least - to lend credence to St. Paul's conviction, expressed in Romans (derived originally from the Stoics), that there is a natural "law" of some kind written on every human heart through the internal voice of conscience. In this way, I don't find atheism threatening so much as comforting, in what it may be construed to imply about human nature.
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Then you are not describing true beliefs. Our beliefs INFORM our actions, and if they don't, then we hold them spuriously (which means we don't really believe them, we just pretend to because we think we ought to, for whatever reason).
McBell
Resident Sourpuss
McBell
Resident Sourpuss
Insecure men.
Now please explain how the answer "insecure men" answers the OP question.
I think this is going too much into philosophical territory than I'm apt to write about at half one in the morning, but my simple answer would be, How do you know whether a person truly believes something? If a man believes in Jesus in the traditional Christian way, but never prays, never takes communion, never goes to Church, never is baptised, can you say with certainty he's not a true believer? He may truly, utterly and completely believe in Christian doctrine, he just may be too lazy or asocial to do any of the rituals associated therewith.
Iymus
Active Member
Essentially it seems you don't think a lack of male guidance will be a problem in single parent households because of male guidance in society.
which is why I should have originally asked
because unfortunately now the context of which I am asking can be sidestepped whether deliberately or unintentionally
the following is just an example. it's quite a bit more in my opinion.
Absence of a Father's Authority and Discipline
Effects of Fatherless Families on Crime Rates [Marripedia]
The dominant role of fathers in preventing delinquency is well-established. Over fifty years ago, this phenomenon was highlighted in the classic studies of the causes of delinquency by Sheldon and Eleanor Glueck of Harvard University.22) They described in academic terms what many children hear their mothers so often say: “Wait till your father gets home!” In a well-functioning family, the very presence of the father embodies authority, an authority conveyed through his daily involvement in family life.23) This paternal authority is critical to the prevention of psychopathology and delinquency.24)
The benefits a child receives from his relationship with his father are notably different from those derived from his relationship with his mother. The father contributes a sense of paternal authority and discipline which is conveyed through his involved presence.25) The additional benefits of his affection and attachment add to this primary benefit. Albert Bandura, professor of psychology at Stanford University, observed as early as 1959 that delinquents suffer from an absence of the father's affection.26)
22) Sheldon and Eleanor T. Gluceck, Unraveling Juvenile Delinquency (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1950).
23) Anne Campbell, “Self-Reported Delinquency and Home Life: Evidence from a Sample of British Girls,” Journal of Youth and Adolescence 16, no. 2 (1987). This is not to diminish the importance of the father’s affiliation with his children in other areas—for example, sexual identity, to name but one.
24) Ellis Pitt-Atkins and Alice Thomas, Loss of the Good Authority: The Cause of Delinquency (London: Viking, 1989).
“Father Presence,” National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse. Available at Father Presence Accessed July 7, 2015.
25) “Involved presence” means active participation by the father in supervising the child’s progress: at a minimum, by monitoring and correcting the child.
26) Albert Bandura and R.H. Walters, Adolescent Aggression (New York: Ronald Press, 1959).