Gene Frenkle

I might be nervous if I were a superstitious simpleton who didn't have the balls to think critically and honestly about my belief system.

I never claimed Jefferson didn't believe in god, but it's nice of you to explain exactly what the man was thinking. To my knowledge, Jefferson was a Deist. I'm pretty sure that means he didn't believe in the "trinity" or subscribe to Christianity. His advocacy of RIDICULE is the relevant part of that quote. No, that's not even close to true. You're staying that any claim I make up out of whole cloth has legitimacy, which is crap. It's on ME to support my extraordinary claims. It's the Spaghetti Monster thing if you care to read up on that again. LOL...I actually write code, unlike your sorry arse, and have been doing so for 15+ years. I also manage a team of software developers, so I think I qualify as IT. How's that Project Management that you love to talk about so much coming along? I consider myself agnostic, leaning towards atheism because I see absolutely no evidence to support the need for a divine creator in our universe. All I see are a bunch of old stories and superstitions used by religious leaders over the centuries to keep the plebs in line. Show me some evidence for god and I'll gladly change my mind, but my intellectual integrity won't allow me to just believe because I want to. If you can talk yourself into such a stance, more power to you, I guess. As far as knowing next to nothing, well, we know more and more all the time. The gaps in scientific knowledge where god resides are shrinking year by year. People are leaving the churches because they are now seeing these institutions for what they are and have fewer things that need to be explained by "god did it". Regardless, our "knowing nothing" provides no proof of anything.

With regard to this type of topic, I can't think of anything more offensive, arrogant or un-Christlike than to claim another human being will burn and be tortured for eternity for what he believes. You claim to know the rules and the mind of your benevolent god so well as to feel comfortable making such statements? I'm sure it helps to soothe your hurt butt, but Jesus! Maybe you should turn that judgemental spotlight on yourself.

James Randi is a magician who, much like Harry Houdini, has decided to dedicate his life to debunking pseudo-science, supernatural beliefs, and to some extent, religion. He's usually not really in-your-face about the religion thing. From time to time he does this stage act with the intent of discrediting homeopathy, which is basically based on the principal that 'like cures like'. Homeopaths generally dilute 'something' many, many, many times over until the actual probability of the final solution containing any molecule that is not water is near zero. They package that water up, sell it to the gullible public and profit. Randi purposely 'overdoses' on an entire package of homeopathic sleeping pills on stage to prove their inefficacy. It's an effective demonstration to prove a point about something that is actually provable. Here's Randi at TED if you're interested: http://www.ted.com/talks/james_randi.html The people making these videos, which I do consider over-the-top and offensive, have no way to prove or disprove the existence of god or the afterlife or any of that other spiritual stuff. They are doing the most offensive things they can think of to invoke the wrath of god. The lack of consequence is probably supposed to prove something to the believers, which is usually an impossible waste of time anyway. Like I said, it's offensive and likely pointless. One of my favorite quotes from Thomas Jefferson, which may help explain (if not excuse) the YouTube videos: The thing that is often missed or ignored by those who believe in extraordinary things is that the burden of proof for any such claim lies with the claimant. Just as it is not your responsibility to prove that Voodoo or mummy curses are real, it is not the atheist's responsibility to prove that god or the afterlife exist. Something Carl Sagan once wrote that shows this: Penn Jillette has every reason not to believe in the extraordinary claim of Anthropogenic Global Warming until the claimants provide sufficient proof of its existence. Likewise, he has every reason not to believe in god or the afterlife until the claimants provide any proof of either's existence. And finally...a quote from famed blasphemer Richard Dawkins, which kind of supports your original post with regards to Voodoo and mummy curses: Everyone has the capacity and usually even the inclination to think critically about most things. Most everyone has one or two 'sacred cows' which they exclude from their critical thought process. For many, many people, religion is one of those sacred cows.

Good job, I stand corrected.

I already corrected myself. The snowflake part is a reference to Fight Club. Truthfully, with an emphasis on the capital 'T', conveys additional meaning that your re-write does not, in my grammatically-incorrect opinion.

Ah, I just re-read it. The first should have read: Just don't want you to think you're a special snowflake with some kind of powerfully Truthful insight. (Leading 'I' omitted as a stylistic choice, 'don't you want' instead of 'don't want you' because of temporary dyslexia) As far as I can tell, the phrase following the period is a legitimate sentence, whatever you may think about its quality: Cause you're not. (Leading ''' or 'Be' omitted as a stylistic choice) "Alaska Darin times Alaska Darin" is a sentence lacking only in punctuation. You should move to China. I hear they have implemented the best free market currently in existence!

I was just trying for a content-appropriate response. Would you care to dissect that first sentence and analyze what you find so appalling?

Those were actually two sentences and I've definitely seen worse here. The period after the first is the giveaway. I'll try to be clearer in the future. *Yawn* How typical...lol

Just don't you want to think you're a special snowflake with some kind of powerfully Truthful insight. Cause you're not.

Normally I don't reply to your bloviating, rambling idiocy, but are you actually suggesting that the Chinese government does not control China's "free" market???

Libertarian ideals sound great until you have to implement them and have actual people live up to them, much like Socialist ideals.

utopian dreamers

Aw, he took his Southern Avenger website down...what a kitty! Fortunately, Google caches such things: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:BO1MbUvDCaoJ:www.southernavenger.com/+&cd=5&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us Let's all remember to toast John Wilkes Booth on his next birthday, May 10th.

She's 50 and has been going to that school for 10 years? Something tells me she has bigger issues than those damned Mexicans!

Lol, coming from you??? Nice job! The WNY market? Well this is a Bills board. I didn't realize you all were such slaves to the whims of the media like the rest of us liberal lemmings. So, what's your take on this one, genius?

Yet another example of a wannabe with a gun taking things way too far. I'd rather see these types convicted. What an !@#$. Did I miss the 200 page thread in which all you non-racist gun enthusiasts payed close attention to this trial and vehemently defended this man's right to defend himself with deadly force?

Yeah, that's all you really had to say. No matter how you want to try to justify it, the dead kid had nothing to do with what happened after his death. No matter how long-winded you might want to be, there's no excuse for that sort of crap. Pretty un-Christ-like in my godless opinion.

Oh, you don't get it. Chicago is referenced ad nauseum because Obama is from Chicago and it's a place where those black thug gangbangers often get killed by other black thug gangbangers. It's intended as a shot at the president and represents kind of a not-so-secret handshake among Fox News aficionados.

Trayvoning? Links to shops of a dead kid? You guys are !@#$ed up.

First, expecting all people to take care of themselves and take personal responsibility for their actions is a utopian pipe dream. Second, you're just cutting the chain of events off at a convenient point for your argument. Taking away abortion and contraception leads to more babies being produced by the most irresponsible people who are least ready to take care of the resulting offspring, directly leading to additional burdens on the rest of society. Touting this type of moral legislation and then bitching about welfare babies shows a complete disconnect in logical thinking. I get your whole Ayn Rand thing and I even like some of it, but at some point you have to realize that society will never live up to those ideals.

no it's not

anti-contraception, anti-abortion and anti-welfare for the trifecta...a walking, talking, mouth-breathing contradiction

No, it's about this particular guy. He hates Obama. He is protesting Obama. People who watch Fox News (for anything other than the entertainment value) dislike Obama. He probably watches Fox News over MSNBC. It's a fair assumption to make. It has nothing to do with Fox News' Nazi policies or their promotion of said policies.

I agree, he had so much potential to be entertaining for a while, but just threw it all away. I would love to have seen some of his quotes in response to the outrage generated by his flying the Israeli and Nazi flags side-by-side. His cowardice has robbed me of that and I don't like it at all.