I was told to leave the religious group once for try to debate issues. I think I was wrong to not return. If you can't defend your position, what good is your position?

No matter how hard it's tried.

... him fucking himself.

While we still have people who support the Catholic church every Sunday.

Mind our manners when we have states that can legally discriminate against minorities and gays. Yes I'll watch my manners.

based only on their religious beliefs.

of postings everywhere with the completely unsupported claim that a man-god had risen from the dead.
And of course the condemnation of those who don't believe that particular myth.


But yeah...Bad Atheists!!!

Fortunately, we are in the Religion Group where we can discuss sky daddies, psychotic mothers, and child rape to our hearts' content.

that is fortunate.

Tolerance is good even for silly fantasy Easter bunny beliefs, sure.

Believers are the ones with a manners problem. They keep trying to legislate and control others in the name of a "God" they can't show a shred of evidence exists.

Mind that.

But I mean that in the nicest and most polite way.

what is it with Victorian nutbars and their hold on public discourse? I mean, one British guy is the reason we have Israel today

I started my own conversation with other atheists recently about how well many of the supposed parallels between Jesus and other religious characters hold up, Horus among them.

Although the discussion never really got around to nailing down many specific details, my general impression was there are a few loose parallels, but certainly not a strong as would justify some stupid internet memes that get passed around.

I'm fine with the admonition that atheists do their own cause no good by brandishing bullshit when they supposedly pride themselves on evidence and reason.

The segue from that problem, however, into something about minding one's manners, and the defeatist "I’ve realized that while my religious objections weren’t going anywhere nor were the beliefs and feelings of others", seems clunky and forced.

While it's true that you hardly ever see people's minds changed right before your eyes, during the course of any single discussion (or stupid squabble), people's minds do change over time. Numerous polls now show a trend toward declining religiousness. While correlation is not causation, and while there are other factors to consider (the growing ugliness of fundamentalism has certainly driven many away from religion), it's probably not purely coincidence that religion is declining over the same time period when atheism has become more outspoken.

There's certainly no evidence for the opposite, that atheists would better serve their cause by being quieter, more reserved, and delicately careful about causing offense. Yes, being more vocal sometimes means loud idiocy and pointless rudeness is going to happen. But that's a general human fault, not a particularly atheist failing.