Brad Pitt Rocks!
Out of context: Reply #41
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- BRNK0
The commonly accepted definition of a religious moderate in the atheist community is on the other end of the spectrum from a fundamentalist... a person who ignores large parts of their so-called holy text in order to rectify their religious beliefs and their modern lifestyle.
When someone says "Everyone can believe what they want to." They are giving intellectual shelter to religious extremists who act out some of the loonier, more violent things written in the world's various "holy texts". I believe this is an amoral idea to postulate.
We've decided as a society that certain types of beliefs and behavior are simply harmful to the world (since by definition a true belief necessarily dictates action), like believing that children are suitable sexual partners or that a certain race of person is inferior and needs to be eradicated. Why then can you hold other, possibly equally harmful beliefs, if you do so under the banner of religion? As an institution throughout history religion has done much harm and should not enjoy the untouchable status it currently has in our society. Certainly no other equally valuable and helpful social institution, such as politics, enjoys such a status.
I'm pretty sure that you'd have a hard time finding atheists that are against gay marriage because the corner stone of atheism is rational thought and science has proven that homosexuality is a natural state (there is a gay gene), not a choice. Therefore opposing gay marriage is a restriction of civil rights.
Sorry for being inflammatory in my original post. I enjoy level headed discussions of this sort.