Is there any room for respect?

You, my good sir, have certainly earned my respect.

Of what you said, all of it is true.

Respect is not taught or tolerated unless at the business end of a stick. This place is a reflection of society pretty much, sad though it may be. It's not so much about inflicting one's own views on another, but trying to make everyone else seem stupid, or demean their intellect. Somehow this makes those with damaged self-esteem and ego issues feel superior. The only problem with this is that collectively society itself accepts this type of behavior, which is just a reflection of it's own collective ignorance. It's easier to be stupid than to work at being and acting intelligently. In this behavior they end up losing any credibility they could possibly hope to have on the subject of spirituality. They undo themselves my friend... but are too stupid to see this.

Thanks for your observations... they are a rarity here.

Challenging other peoples views is part of human nature. If we didn't do this then we all would still believe the world was flat.

Interestingly enough, the church made a similar argument back then. How right they were :/

Hi, our sins r the reason us having become so destructive to each other.But each of us have to first protect our souls from sins n God's judgement,n we need 2 turn to Lord Jesus Christ in repentence for our salvation.Pls spend time alone with the Lord in spirit n truth,keeping away from idols.As u persevere with the Lord,He will lead u 2 people to share the truth with them,about our sins n the deliverence from its bondage.That would b the right way to go about concerning the issue u hv noted. true-shapherd.blogspot.in

i respect anyone's right to believe in whatever they want, but i do not respect their efforts to impose their beliefs on government and education ...

if they keep it private, they won't have any trouble from me ...

It's a long story... But it's a story about injustice, so you might like to hear it sometime.

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"No one is forcing you to agree with anyone else."

That's just the problem. They ARE. I don't know what the "spiritual" weather is like in your country, but where I live, the Church is funded by the State, from tax payers' (aka myself) money. Politics always get a "religious" spin, with candidates trying to fool voters into agreeing with them by invoking the power of God and Jesus. Children are baptized and enrolled in the State religion when they're no older than TWO MONTHS OLD. Afterwards, when population census is done (and according to the census, money is given to religions, from the same aforementioned tax payers' money) they don't mark you down as "atheist" even if you tell them to - they consider baptizing a clear, ETERNAL sign of belonging to said religion - the OFFICIAL STATE RELIGION. Hence, even though religiosity has been dying in my country for the past 20 years, 90% of the population is still marked as "Orthodox Christians" and the Orthodox church still gets tons of money out of it.

Children have "religion" classes in kindergarten and school, all the way to the end of high school. There they are not taught about all religions, but indoctrinated with the prejudice and lifestyle of the official religion. Orthodox Christianity.

And above all this, if you say you're an atheist, you're treated like a paraya. As happens if you refuse to baptise your own child, or to get married in a church.

Basically, atheists are denied existence. The State and the Church do everything in their power to refuse to acknowledge us. When asked how we can take back that stupid ritual that was done to us when we were two months old, and thus become "official" atheists, doors just get slammed in our faces. And then again we get noted down as "christians" in the census. Basically, we were thrown in before we knew we existed, and now we can't get out. When a political candidate is an atheist and wants to fight for our rights, he gets called "Satanist", "godless", "immoral" on television. They accuse him of going straight to Hell, having been sent to "preach against God" by Satan himself. And thus, indirectly, they accuse ALL of us of the same things. We either don't exist, or we're the scum of society and should be shunned.

In public eyes, we are a shameful component of the population.

So excuse me for harboring poison against this THING that is in itself a social poison; but the circumstances have pushed me to the intolerant attitude I display. If they let me alone and ACKNOWLEDGED me, as I am, and gave me all my spiritual rights they have, I would be tolerant towards them. But when there's injustice done towards me, how can I just sit there and take it, and not retort?

Until we get it into people's heads that we atheists have the same rights as they do, and that their combination of religion with politics and education is VERY MUCH against not only OUR rights but also against the rights of other religions, nothing will be solved and injustices will still be done to us and our kids. We're not trying to proselytize, we're trying to EDUCATE people, into understanding that we're NOT: immoral / amoral; we're NOT satanists; we do NOT practice rituals; we do not lack spiritual values and do NOT lack in our feelings of love and tenderness.

So I'm sorry but every mean word they get from me, they deserved completely. Until they learn to show ME respect, why should I show THEM any? Just to be trampled on and insulted and have injustices done to me and my children? No, thank you. This isn't even a problem of "I don't agree with you" anymore. This is a day-to-day problem I have to put up with.

Not when it comes to religion. It deserves all the ridicule we can throw at it.

SERIOUS QUESTIONS ALWAYS GET RESPECT BY SERIOUS ANSWERS

better you shut your computer down.