This is far enough away from actual oppressed sexual minorities that we can point at them and laugh, right?

Thank you. This is what I was trying to say, more awkwardly.

I could give a fuck about whether or not you are religious.

Use of the expression “Imaginary sky daddy” is shorthand for “I’m not that smart, but I sure do like drawing attention to myself and getting a rise out of people.”

Agreed. If 99% of scientists agree on a topic, we shouldn’t place the outlier on equal footing. But, as a devout atheist and liberal, I must confess that what we’re doing isn’t working. To quote my favorite cokehead writer, “If liberals are so fucking smart, why do they lose so goddamn much?” We haven’t made nearly…

Aw, thanks. I’m just trying to help people understand how to win friends and influence people =)

Believe it or not, I’m mostly agnostic. I’m literally just saying, “Don’t stoop to their level and be a dick about it.”

No, this is ignoring a lot of how the sides have interacted over the years. Liberals have lost a lot of ground through mocking, and are unwittingly part of the reason Trump, with his anti-intellectual garble, has been able to make such headway in our country. I am NOT saying that the views aren’t mock-able. Clearly…

Being a dick about things isn’t being reasonable. My comments on this page have all boiled down to “Hey, be polite!” stemming more from my background as a teacher who doesn’t like intellectual elitism more than my background as a religious person.

That’s cool, but I do think that it’s interesting that I get so much pushback from atheists for basically saying “Hey, be polite!”

Exactly- I’m adamently pro-choice, but I wasn’t always, and the “LALALALALA Let’s pretend that this isn’t a vaguely uncomfortable subject from all angles and just dismiss people on the fence as idiots” is a huge part of the problem that the pro-choice movement has. Anti-choicers twist their ideas to sound moderate.…

You do realize that there are a *ton* of religious democrats, right? Of all sorts of religions! You’re implying here that anyone who is religious automatically holds all the regressive beliefs of the religion, which is flat-out not true.

Well, I have about eight conversations going and a baby to look after, so I’m responding on a comment-by-comment basis, and I might get off-base from the general thrust of the conversation.

Why the fuck did this entire board become an “asshole atheist” one?

While I’m sure that’s how many see Him, your understanding of how faith works is really, really off-base and condescends to people who actually think about religion deeply. I’m glad you got a story idea, though! Have fun with that.

Why the need for a nickname? Why the need to denigrate sincerely held beliefs? Argue on the merits. Seriously, I am utterly atheist and essentially communist and not one single person is going to be swayed to my side of an argument if I start by calling them childish, corrupt, or evil. This stuff is the sharp end of…

Let me ask; why are you liberal? Because listening to others stories, even ones that have parts you disagree with, is usually one of the great hallmarks of liberalism.

Yeah, “They started it! They’re worse!” is such a great defense.

You sound like someone that hasn’t had many conversations with conservatives that weren’t just shouting matches.

You do realize that not all religious people are conservative, don’t you? It was my church that planted a huge seed of doubt about my parents’ conservatism in my mind.