Atheist Tuesday: Sound and Fury, Pt. 1

34 CommentsAtheist Tuesday

I have to wonder. It perplexes me. I’m somewhat confused. Help me to understand.

Why, if there is no God, as the atheist, unbeliever, rationalist, evolutionist, cynic proclaims, do some of them get so angry when Christians state the plain facts truthfully that there is One? Why are they so darn mean and angry when we explain plainly that He has a standard that He will judge everyone by? And why are they so, so, undiplomatic and tactless when explaining their (erroneous) point of view?

Periodically, I like to review some of the comments made by unbelievers as they view some of my YouTube videos. I’m truly amazed at the bile they spew in my (and Ray Comfort’s) direction, when all I’m doing is espousing a contrary view to theirs.

Here are some random sample comments from videos I’ve posted over the last year:

In response to my video
“Ray Comfort Thanks the Atheists”—

From aaron4820: nice career you’ve got going on here…. you know you’re full of expletive, we all know you’re full of expletive, but the idiots who follow you and buy your expletive believe in you! nice one, keep up the good work feeding off stupid people, and it’s not like you’re going to hell for such immortal behaviour, because let’s face it, we both know there’s no hell, or heaven for that matter.

From eatingfatty: I would have punched him in the mouth for saying that Charles Darwin would be a great imagineer. This man is a fool, nothing but a fool.

From Patambo2000: Estos dos hombres son unos estupidos!

In response to my video
“Origin of Species Give-away at USC: LIVE!”:

From MINGO4445: Brainwash for poor minded people. Wake up christians, take out your brain filter.

From dreamy2: christians are stupid

From Pirantub: Keep on shouting from the rooftops, every village needs an idiot. Makes it entertaining for the rest of us.

And in response to my video
“Professor Darwin of USC”

From MrStephenFrohnhofer: Wow, Pastor Steve… you’re a ridiculously bad interviewer and debater…

From ZLNewton: Prof. Stanford just made a fool of you, sir. Intellectual people don’t buy into your scripted, repetative, Comfort-esque expletive. [Steve’s note: I did point out to this intellectual that he misspelled repetitive. Sorry. Couldn’t help it.]

Hegemon54: hahaha you got owned, you looked like a complete idiot debating with him

But on occasion, some people do listen—and understand:

pbooga1: the professor has a good point bcuz if God judged evrybody to the ten commandments nobody would b goin to heaven

So again, why are these people so darn mad?

CLICK HERE FOR PART 2.

Comments (34)

  1. Garrett

    Reply

    We just explained it to Tony. Do you need a repeat lesson?

    You vote and participate in politics. You seek to deny rights to gays. You impede on scientific progress. You try to retard the education of our children.

    In short: your actions are seen as negative by us and harmful to others. I generally don’t get angry over it. It’s the deception and methods you use that can get me a tad upset. I don’t get that angry because you are, ultimately, a tiny part of the religious people in this country. You are probably as much a minority as us Atheists. But, whereas we are on the grow, you face decay and decline.

    You have a serious persecution complex. I can tell you that most of those replies are not angry. They may be mocking or sarcastic, but rarely outraged anger. But you can’t help but see everything as scary agents of Satan out to oppress you.

  2. Hugo

    Reply

    “Why, if there is no God … do they get so angry when Christians state the plain facts truthfully that there is One?”

    You start by saying “if there is no God”. Using that assumption, you are a liar, and it’s normal to be angry at people who lie.

    However, most people don’t care about whether you claim that God is real or not, they are never (rarely?) angry about that. What people care about are the things we KNOW are true (human evolution perhaps?) and that you lie about. That is good reason to be angry at you (not that I am angry myself, not at all, because I consider you harmless…)

    People also care about the means you utilize to share your religious views. Even if your intentions are good, your actions seem to be highly annoying for a lot of people (I remember the tract slipped in a car, just to name that one 😉 )

    Oh, and notice that I use the word “people” because I KNOW that a lot of believers agree with me.

    “Why are they so darn mean and angry when we explain plainly that He has a standard that He will judge everyone by?”

    Because you use YOUR standards, not God’s standards. If God is real, then you have no special connection to Him and no reason to think that you have THE correct interpretation. The Bible you use is simply one of many religious books that you could have use

    You confuse the fact that people are annoyed by YOU, not by God.

    “And why are they so, so, undiplomatic and tactless when explaining their (erroneous) point of view?”

    Some people do act like idiots and that is very unfortunate. It happens with people of all background and all opinions. You, Steve, is a good example of a theist who acts and think in an unproductive way. There are examples of atheists who are just as bad as you. This has NOTHING to do with beliefs.

    Sorry for the insulting tone, I’m only attacking certains beliefs and actions… not a person (Steve) as a whole.

    Cheers!

  3. perdita

    Reply

    “I’m truly amazed at the bile they spew in my (and Ray Comfort’s) direction, when all I’m doing is espousing a contrary view to theirs.”

    Steve, it’s YouTube. Are you seriously suggesting that evangelical videos are the only YouTube videos with trollish comments? Because I see that sort of behaviour in other video comments as well. Rather than a ‘believer/unbeliever’ thing, it’s just churlish immaturity. I’ve also seen that sort of stuff from believers directed at unbelievers. But if you want to use these to validate your beliefs, go to town, man. Seems rather flimsy to me. But, I suppose without any actual evidence to support your beliefs, you’re sort of reduced to this.

  4. vintango2k

    Reply

    I agree Steve, we should be civil in debate but welcome to the internet, where the trolls come out to play. The ability to anonymously leave posts without fear of reprisal from anyone or anything pretty much means people are without any mental or verbal filters. They can post whatever thought pops into their head, no matter how base or low it is. And then its usually up to moderators to delete it… or software filters.

    The reason the ‘unbeliever’ can get really angry or mean, boil down to two contributing factors. The unbeliever and the believer.

    In debate you have two opposing view points and its usually up to the audience to decide which argument wins out in the end, and on occasion, its also done to try and convince the opponent to change their minds. You do this all the time Steve when you preach to people, you’re trying to convince them to accept your world view based on what the Bible tells you.

    In the case of the ‘unbeliever’ (atheist, agnostic, muslim, non-Christian, pagan, etc) usually they have an alternative view point based on something else. Take for an example, a research scientist who uses the tenets of evolution to study the HIV virus in the development of treatments. He has studied evolution, biology, and various life sciences in order to get his doctorate, and may still believe in God but he accepts that evolution is an undeniable fact (It would be difficult for him to be a biologist otherwise), so he doesn’t accept the view points of the Young Earth Creationist. OR he may not believe in the Judeo Christian version of God, and is either agnostic or atheist, but either way he’s spent years of his life developing this view point and its vindicated by peer reviewed evidence and real testable lab experiments, its something tangible and knowable to him.

    Now that scientist is confronted by a Young Earth Creationist.

    The second factor of why the ‘unbeliever’ gets upset comes from their interaction and the behavior of the ‘believer’. In watching these interviews, the believer, lets just use Ray as an example but Steve you’re guilty of this as well, will often adopt an attitude of passive aggressive condescension to the ‘unbeliever’, and the conversation is almost universally one way. The ‘believer’ will make their case for God and in Ray’s case he’ll give the ‘unbeliever’ the good person test. The case comes directly from the Bible, end of story, end of conversation, and any attempts made by the ‘unbeliever’ to argue against that are dismissed.

    The passive aggressive condescension is also obvious when the ‘believer’ smiles, laughs and dismisses a comment of the ‘unbeliever’ (such as evolution) as “That’s a crazy myth” or that’s a “crazy belief isn’t it?”. The laugh and dismal is just as mocking to someone who’s studied those sciences and has based a career around them as it is just as mocking as it is to openly insult a ‘believers’ God to their face, or to say, remove the 10 Commandments from a courthouse. It provokes anger.

    The one sided nature of the conversation also angers the ‘unbeliever’ because any argument they have or point of view they want to express is simply ignored or tossed aside by the ‘believer’ in an effort to preach at them. Its also the primary reason why people do not liked to be preached to, because there is no exchange of ideas in the conversation, its simply a one way chat, with the ‘believer’ telling the ‘unbeliever’ what they must do or say. The ‘believer’ expressing a condescending attitude because he, by default, comes from an assumed place of superiority or authority that the ‘unbeliever’ either doesn’t accept or thinks otherwise.

    The inflexibility of the ‘believer’ to expand their view point also angers unbelievers. Ray, for example, still uses images of a Crocoduck to speak out against evolution, but when confronted by scientists who blatantly point out that that’s not what evolution is about and will explain to him, sometimes over and over again, the fossil record, the evidence in DNA, or why a hybrid Duck Crocodile couldn’t exist, he will still dismiss it and continues to use the portrait of the Crocoduck in his argument when he knows better. That’s dishonest, its like saying saying Christians still believe the Earth is flat. Its also why Creationists will CONTINUE to site examples of “fallacy” in evolution that were dismissed as hoaxes sometimes over a hundred years ago, they will not change their view point, leading ‘unbelievers’ to throw their hands up in frustration.

    Its not an unbeliever’s default anger towards your God that makes them angry, Steve, its the attitude of His spokespeople. Don’t believe me? In your youTube video, Ray sent a banana and an altered copy of Origins to Dawkins, and you laughed about it. Was his act, an act of kindness, did he generally hope Dawkins would convert? No. He did it to mock him and to provoke him. If he wanted him to generally ‘see the light’ the both of you would have been serious in your conversation, and not betrayed your own amusement. Its that very attitude that upsets people, and many pick up on it, either consciously or subconsciously.

  5. Nameless Cynic

    Reply

    Umm… so, you tell people that they need to follow your flavor of Christianity or they’re going to Hell, to burn for all eternity in a pit of flame, and you wonder why they might find your message a little off-putting? Yeah, some of them get a little thrill of schadenfreude when you stumble – when you’ve spent the day telling them they’re sinners, you have to expect some negativity. Particularly when so much of what you say goes completely against logic, and such large numbers on your side keep trying to get (or keep) your religion into law.

    Admittedly, your selection there shows a certain level of immaturity in many cases, but it’s interesting that your opening sentence there is claiming that we’re ALL like that.

  6. Quasar

    Reply

    Her: Hey, “Honest” Steve, FYI: It’s YouTube. What you just did was go into the Tourettes ward of a Mental Hospital, ask which patients were atheists, and then quote the juciest responses as proof that all atheists have Tourettes. Yeah they spew bile at you. But they also spew even worse bile at Thunderfoot and NonStampCollector, and the bile spewers there are christian. It means nothing, because it’s YouTube.

    And I think you know this already, but hey: anything to paint the heretics in a bad light, right? Can’t afford to get hung up on little, unimportant things like honesty and ethics and the 9th commandment when you’re spreading the gospel now, can you?

  7. Steve Sanchez

    Reply

    Thank you all for your reasonable and nice replies. I changed the “they” in second paragraph to “some of them.”

    Not all of you are angry. My bad.

  8. perdita

    Reply

    “…I changed the “they” in second paragraph to “some of them.”

    Not all of you are angry…”

    lol And that’s the only thing Steve takes away from this.

  9. Nameless Cynic

    Reply

    Here you go, Steve. An atheist, asking the same question – just not assuming it’s persecution.

    Welcome to the Intarwebs, my boy.

    [Steve’s note: I edited out the website]

    (Oh, and did I read just a touch of irony in “Thank you all for your reasonable and nice replies”? Irony makes the angels cry, you know…)

  10. BathTub

    Reply

    See you Angry Atheists are never satisfied. You are lucky to get that!

    …

    How many seconds do you think it would take me to find Angry and Hateful Christian comments Steve?

    • Steve Sanchez

      Reply

      I wouldn’t call angry and hateful “Christians,” Christians, BathTub.

      Not all who say they are Christians are.

      There should be a difference when one comes to Christ.

  11. Hugo

    Reply

    Steve:
    “…I changed the “they” in second paragraph to “some of them.”
    Not all of you are angry…”

    perdita:
    “lol And that’s the only thing Steve takes away from this.”

    ******

    lol! pretty funny indeed. That’s why I rarely comment on blogs like this anymore. There is no conversation going on. It’s really just for the fun/interest of analyzing other points of views.

    See you all, in… a month or two maybe? 😉

  12. perdita

    Reply

    And Steve counters with a ‘No True Scotsman.’

    Trust me, Hugo. It’s all fun. I don’t expect anything more.

  13. vintango2k

    Reply

    @Perdita

    It seems that way, not sure if you read my earlier WALL of text, but that’s also one of the reasons ‘unbelievers’ get mad at ‘believers’, because most people, I think, don’t like to talk to a brick wall. I think the only example I’ve seen of an attempted two way conversation is when Ray Comfort ‘interviewed’ a bunch of know-nothing college students about why they believe in evolution and they were clueless. I’m sure if he had interviewed a science major he would have gotten a much different response and MIGHT have actually learned something.

  14. vintango2k

    Reply

    And sorry I don’t mean to flood with posts but this popped into my head after I submitted it, but Steve, and I don’t mean to pry into your personal life, but would you allow your kids to study evolution and biology in a science class when they reach an age to understand and grasp the concept, such as a high school or college biology course?

  15. Steve Sanchez

    Reply

    Since evolution fantasy theory is prevalent everywhere, we strongly teach the Biblical worldview, and encourage our children to compare secular thinking with Biblical thinking.

  16. perdita

    Reply

    vintango – I always read comments -wall ‘o text or not. You seem a very thoughtful person.

    Steve (or anyone else who wants to jump in), when you encourage your kids to ‘compare secular thinking with Biblical thinking’ are they getting their information from secular publications or creationist publications?

  18. Nohm

    Reply

    perdita wrote: “Steve (or anyone else who wants to jump in), when you encourage your kids to ‘compare secular thinking with Biblical thinking’ are they getting their information from secular publications or creationist publications?”

    Considering that Steve has admitted that everything he knows about evolution comes from creationist sources, and not secular ones, I think I know the honest answer to your question.

    In other news, Steve, I don’t think “random sampling” means what you think it means.

    And, as an aside, I gotta find it strange that when Steve uses the word “random” in the context of evolution, he means “everything goes”. But when he uses “random” in the context of “a random sampling of atheist comments”, he means a selection, because I highly doubt that he wrote up a program using a random number generator to select those quotes from a sample set.

    Interesting, yes?

    As for the post, this is more of the same persecution complex. Nothing new to see here.

    Steve, you do jerky evangelism and then wonder why it annoys people. Seriously? I mean, like, seriously?

  19. Nohm

    Reply

    Here’s something I learned when I was a young boy, Steve: if you act like a jerk to people, they won’t necessarily be nice to you back.

    I can’t imagine that you’re actually this dense, so I’m wondering what your angle is here.

  20. Steve Sanchez

    Reply

    In regard to the type of material we use to teach our children: Of course it’s Christian! We don’t want to use biased material! 😉

    Nohm wrote: I can’t imagine that you’re actually this dense, so I’m wondering what your angle is here.

    Me: My angle? As you wait, the answer will be evolve….

  21. perdita

    Reply

    Thanks. Just wanted to verify.

    Regarding the “Fun with Evolution: Elephant Man?” post, did you ever contact CRI to find out why they lied about the articles they cited?

  22. Quasar

    Reply

    Nohm: I can’t imagine that you’re actually this dense, so I’m wondering what your angle is here.

    Steve: My angle? As you wait, the answer will be evolve….

    Oh hey look: Steve’s right, it is!

    G0: PJZEIFEFPXVKYGD
    G1: PJZEIFEFP VKYGD
    G2: PYZEIFEFP VKYGD
    G3: PYZEIFEFP VKSGD
    G4: PYZEIFEFP JKSGD
    G5: PYZEIFEFP JKSUD
    G6: PYZEIFEFP JESUD
    G7: PYZEGFEFP JESUD
    G8: PYZEG EFP JESUD
    G9: PYZEG FFP JESUD
    G10: LYZEG FFP JESUD
    G11: LYZEG FOP JESUD
    G12: LYZEG FOP JESUS
    G13: LYZEG FOG JESUS
    G14: LYHEG FOG JESUS
    G15: LYIEG FOG JESUS
    G16: LYIQG FOG JESUS
    G17: LYIQG FOX JESUS
    G18: LYIQG FOD JESUS
    G19: LYIQG FOI JESUS
    G20: LYING FOI JESUS
    G21: LYING FOX JESUS
    G22: LYING FOR JESUS

    (Yeah, I built my own weasel program. It’s amazing what what “random chance” plus selection can achieve in only 22 generations, isn’t it?)

  23. perdita

    Reply

    Why should I? I’m not the one buying what they’re selling. It appears you do.

    ——
    Steve Sanchez says:
    March 31, 2010 at 7:51 am

    Perdita,

    You bring up some very good points. Let me look into this further. I may want to drop an email to CRI to get their response. Thanks.
    —–

    You’ve indicated you don’t think lying is a good thing. So what should I take away from here – lies about things you’re against are okay?

  24. perdita

    Reply

    Exactly. You don’t mind that organizations like CRI misrepresent ideas you don’t agree with. And yet, you seem to think that lying is bad.

  25. Steve Sanchez

    Reply

    And how am I lying for Jesus exactly?

    Folks, you have to understand something. Admittedly, I know very little about evolutionary theory; apparently, many of you do. Still, the fact remains that God created everything according to Genesis 1. Evolution, the macro kind, cannot happen. Ever.

    So my basic presupposition is that the whole theory is a lie, regardless of any “proof” you may profess. It obviously militates against the Creation account. Stone age? Ignorance? I understand why you would think that. I, too, in my unregenerate state thought the same about fundies (though I always believed that there were some type of God).

    You have a vested interest in not believing the Creation account: If you accede to the truth of this account, you are indeed accountable for your actions.

    Ignorance, in this case, will not be bliss.

    So say what you will about my “lying,” and all the other young earth and old earth creationists lying. It doesn’t make one whit of difference to me; but you, all of you as people, created in the image of God, do matter to me.

    Thanks for reading and continuing to visit this blog.

  27. vintango2k

    Reply

    Thanks Perdita I like your posts as well, you owe me some pie though I think.

    And to further that topic because your reply seemed awfully cryptic Steve, would you allow your kids to attend biology classes where evolution was taught in a secular school or accredited university if they were interested in biology? Or anthropology? Or Paleontology? Its difficult to study Australopithecus afarensis when you don’t believe it could ever have really existed. I mean what if your kids really like science, what if they want to know how the world really works? Or maybe they want to be physicists and study subatomic particles in an effort to understand the building blocks of matter. Maybe they might be the next ones to discover the elements that make up quarks. The only problem is physics also contradicts the Bible, would you allow your kids to study that science objectively as well?

    You like to call evolution a fantasy or rather you cross out fantasy but its still there, in attempt to dismiss it, but it isn’t just evolution that contradicts your world view, its the lion’s share of scientific research from biology to astronomy. The light we perceive as stars has (in some cases) been traversing the universe for millions sometimes billions of years from its origin point, not 6,000 or 10,000 years if the creation account was correct, do you speak out against astronomy? Radiometric dating is the process with which we use to rocks and even the very earth itself, and it contradicts the biblical account, do you speak out against chemistry? Physicists discovered the origin of elements, resulting in the Big Bang theory, do you speak out against Physics?

    The thing is, many many scientists are Christian, and they would like nothing better than to have scientific evidence CONFIRM what’s in the Bible, but it just didn’t happen that way. Most Christian scientists or scientists who have a faith, do what the majority of secular Americans do, they accept that the religious texts were written by people in civilizations that predated modern science and that their understanding of the natural world and the way it works was extremely limited, and that they are allegorical stories meant to tell a moral lesson, or they’re allusions to events or stories that occurred within the Middle Eastern region during the time those books were first written. You don’t have to believe in Genesis to get saved Steve, and its unlikely science will ever be able to prove or disprove the existence of Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, or God, but as humanity’s knowledge of the universe and science expands and we improve our technological capabilities and our standard of living for that matter, we’ll need new fresh and open minds to advance the scientific theories of yesteryear and innovate existing technology, improving upon it. We can’t advance as a species if we cling to myth and superstition in favor of burying our heads in the sand when it comes to science. Who knows, your kids might be great scientists… and they can still believe in Jesus too, I doubt very much that the God who created us and all the amazing complexities of the world, of the UNIVERSE would want us to be willingly ignorant of His Creation and how it truly works.

  28. Mark

    Reply

    “Still, the fact remains that God created everything according to Genesis 1. Evolution, the macro kind, cannot happen. Ever.”

    Steve, let’s try a thought experimetnt. Suppose hypothetically that Genesis 1 was not a wholly accurate version of human history. If you took that presupposition and ran with it, would you then have any objection to evolutionary biology? Is it reason or dogma that underlies your rejection of evolution?

  29. Quasar

    Reply

    And how am I lying for Jesus exactly?

    Folks, you have to understand something. Admittedly, I know very little about evolutionary theory; apparently, many of you do. Still, the fact remains that God created everything according to Genesis 1. Evolution, the macro kind, cannot happen. Ever.

    I can accept that you truly believe this. But the thing is, that doesn’t stop you from understanding it. And understanding it is an imperiative if you wish to comment on it, which you do (with, to be fair, nowhere near the regularity with which Ray Comfort comments on it)

    Let us pretend I was completely ignorant of Genesis 1, but I knew this it could not have occured due to good number of years of my life spent studying palentology. Creation simply can’t happen. EVAR. So I make a blog, and I start deriding creationists for believing absurdities. Okay, all well and good so far. I’ve got every right to do that, and actual creationists have every right to come to my blog and defend themselves.

    But suppose, as part of my derision, I claimed that creationists were responsible for the Holocaust. I claimed that creationists worshipped James Ussher and held to his every word as undeniable doctrine. I claimed that Genesis in it’s entirety is rediculous because snakes don’t have vocal chords, because there isn’t enough water to cover Everest, because there are no windows in the sky, because the world isn’t flat, because we’ve dug down and flown up and found no hell and heaven and because it’s impossible to make a man out of licoriche.

    And suppose, when it was pointed out to me that Genesis doesn’t posit than Adam was made out of licoriche, or that Hitler wasn’t an evangelical young earth creationist, I then refused to accept or acknowledge I had made a mistake and went right back to derision and talking at people…

    … and some time later, pointed out once again the inherent absurdity of Adam, the licoriche man, and the stupidity of the Ussher-worshippers.

    At what point do I stop being worth the benefit of the doubt and become, in the eyes of those I am talking at, a Liar For Palentology? At which point do I stop being “misinformed” and become “dishonest”?

    Even if you don’t think you do this personally, there’s no denying that what I’ve described above is Ray Comfort’s MO.

    Steve, if you want to comment on evolution, then learn what it is. Please. Visit Talk Origins: they’ll give you the basics. Some of their articles even explain how christians, even evangelical christians like Fred Clark and Francis Collins, can accept both without hurting either. And then you’ll be able to disagree from a position of understanding, rather than (as now) a position of willful, self-imposed, ignorance.

  30. Garrett

    Reply

    Well, Steve, your presupposition is wrong. Just because I presuppose that apples cannot be red does not change the fact that there are red apples.

    If you want to live in a fantasy world, that’s fine. And I mean a TRUE fantasy world where you cannot even consider the possibility of you being in err. That’s completely insane.

  31. Garrett

    Reply

    Let me further add that it has nothing to do with being held accountable. I have many interests and my own lifestyle. Some of these mesh just fine with you, Steve. And quite a few don’t. Which is fine, I don’t expect everyone to be the same. That’d be dull.

    But you demand massive changes of me without any good reasoning behind them. “God will damn you to hell for these sins!” you cry. Well, that’s definitely a good reason. What’s your evidence for it? Oh right, the Bible. What verifies that? Right, you just presuppose it all. So basically, “‘Cause I say so.” is your reasoning.

    Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to engage in some gluttony and lust. Actually, I’ll cut back on the gluttony. You see, some people out there can actually present evidence and decent arguments to get me to change my ways. Not with tracts, but evidence backed by years of meticulous research.

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