A conversation over years.

[catsidhe]

Christians[1,2]: You Atheists, you claim to be all ‘reasonable’ and ‘rational’, but really you're just another religion.
Humanists: I, err... what?
Christians: You are, you totally are! You declaim, without being able to prove it, that there is no God. You can't prove there is no God, so you're totally working off faith, which totally makes you a religion, nyah!
Humanists: No we're not. We merely point out that there is no logical need for a God, and that absent any evidence for the existence of a God, any God, you may as well put that question to one side and investigate things which can be proved one way or another.
Christians: Which is a religious viewpoint.
Humanists: WTF?
Christians: You have an opinion on God's existence, which is, therefore, a religious opinion. QED.
Humanists: I... But... Flying Spaghetti Monster! Invisible Unicorn! Invisible Dragon in the Garage! Invisible Teapot in the sky! Gah!
Christians (smugly): Religious.
...
Humanists: ... OK, Fine. Whatever. You say we're a religion, great. We're a religion. And there are a lot of us. So, you know what? As a religion, we demand the right to hold Religious Instruction class in schools, like you do.
Christians: What? WHAT?!? NO! No way! You... you're not even a religion! You can't teach RI, cause you're not even a religion! Geez, you don't even believe in God! How can you be a religion?! This is so totally unfair!
... And if we allow Atheists to do RI, what's next? Witches? Satanists? Unitarians???





[1] Because, by and large, the other religions in Australia have had better things to do with their time than have this argument. Mostly because they were trying to fight off the same Christians trying this on with them...
[2] Obviously not all Christians. Most Christians are simply people trying to live by a code and be true to what they believe, day by day, just like most Jews, most Muslims, most Discordians, most Buddhists, &c &c. It's the ones who are the quickest and loudest to tell you how Christian they are, and how it makes them better people than you, they're the ones I have a serious problem with.

Comments

[drjon.livejournal.com]

I'm all in favour of Atheists teaching in Religious Education.

Bald is, after all, a hairstyle. ;}P>

[pearl]

Yes, I read that in the paper today too.

It makes me wonder if they're really worried about Satanists teaching religious instruction, or just worried that they might show you don't need a god looking over your shoulder in order to be a good, decent person with strong morals.

But, I'm a deist, so my opinion probably shouldn't count. :)

Hey, You Can't Say That! That's Like us Saying... No, Wait!

[bar-barra.livejournal.com]

Indeed. You are probably also aware that for my Other Team (Pro-Enlightenment Christians) the attitude to the Seductive Brethren & God-Botherers International is roughly thus:

You think YOU'RE annoyed with them???

Dude, for us, it's personal...

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

You will understand of course that I especially laughed at the italicised religion...

[(Anonymous)]

Where did this term 'humanists' come from??

-- mpp

[catsidhe.livejournal.com]

the philosophy that ethics, morals and meaning can be derived from human interactions, and there does not need to be a supernatural source for them.

The idea that you should be nice to people because it is good to be nice to people, rather than because an angry God will punish you if you aren't.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't think God's punishment is motivation in all (most?) religions.

-- mpp

[catsidhe.livejournal.com]

In most deistic religions, there is a set of rules set down by God or the Gods (or which even the Gods are bound by), and whatever other reasons there might be to obey, you obey them because they are God's Laws.

Jews don't keep kosher because pork goes off quickly in the Judaean desert, they do it because haShem told them to.

Humanism just says that if a good idea is a good idea, you don't need God telling you to do it, even as a backup in case of recalcitrance.

[cthulu-for-pm.livejournal.com]

I'm all in favour of teaching Discordianism in schools... :-)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_zombiemonkey/]

oh me too! "Okay kids, it's Friday, so throw away those hot dog buns. Now, who can tell me what Kallisti means...?"

I'd also like to see Church of the Subgenius taught. Once kids learn the Doctrine of Reversability, it'd all be over as far as trying to get them to do anything.

Finally though, how much pure fun would kids have running around in the woods at night in black robes screaming "IA SHUB-NIGGURATH!!" If I could have done that in RE class, I may not have ditched it to do maths, which I hated.