Fundy Agnostics, Beware!
You don't have absolute knowledge! You can't know this or that! Be just like me or else you're an idiot! Agnosticism is the One True Path! Sound familiar?
By my personal definitions, and by the accepted definitions of those within my social circles and most intelligent people I meet, I am both an agnostic and an atheist. So it sometimes infuriates me to see psuedo-dogmatic self-labeled agnostics telling me and other atheists that we're the dogmatic ones and that we have as much faith as any Christian, Muslim, or other religious person. You know the type. He's the jerk that tells everyone that they're wrong in believing whatever it is they believe unless they take the "middle path" that he himself claims to take. He's the one that tells you what it is that you believe and that it's wrong. He claims, as if with some kind of absolute knowledge, that no one can know absolutely (oh, yes, the irony) what the "Truth" is, and therefore, because of this, we know that Agnosticism is the Truth (again, the irony). This is what I light-heartedly call the "fundy agnostic." Beware, fundies, your time is up!
That's right, I'm calling you out. Your era of misinformation, denial, and stupidity is over. Your fundamentalism is coming to an end, agnostics! (Keep an air of humor, here; I'm an agnostic myself and do not mean to stereotype us.) You leave a bad taste in my mouth and I, along with the earth itself, am about to spit you out. You call atheists "fundamentalists" all the time-- but you seem to understand neither atheism nor fundamentalism. Your first problem is your incorrect assumptions that atheists believe that there is no God. The definition of "atheist" that most self-labeled atheists use is "someone who lacks a belief in gods" (the same definition I use, myself). So, right there, you're making an ass of yourself. I'm sorry, but someone had to point it out. It's for your own good, I assure you. After this intervention you can walk away a brighter, happier, more enlightened human being.
Even supposing, for the sake of argument, that an atheist is necessarily someone who believes that there are no gods, you make a gross error, Mr. Fundamentalist Agnostic, in equating this sort of belief with fundamentalism. We believe in lots of things without evidence-- that there is no Santa Claus, there are no leprechauns, no gold at the end of a rainbow, and no invisible pink unicorns. You can't take a single belief someone has and suddenly equate it to "faith" or "fundamentalism."
But, you know, that's not even where my real problem with the fundy agnostic lies. It's when the fundy agnostic claims that someone cannot know with any certainty regarding God's existence. Well, how does the fundy agnostic know that? Does the fundy agnostic have absolute knowledge of everyone's beliefs? Does the fundy agnostic know, with absolute knowledge, that someone does not have absolute knowledge of the universe? Does the fundy agnostic know, with absolute knowledge, that someone doesn't know that God does not exist? How does the fundy agnostic know that the atheist doesn't know for sure? The fundy agnostic would have to have absolute knowledge to know something like that! The fundy agnostic has faith that other people are as clueless as he is about God's existence. But the fundy agnostic doesn't actually know that other people don't know. He simply has faith. The same kind of faith that a Christian has in believing in God.
Enjoying the satire, yet? You see, fundamentalist agnosticism is highly irrational. It is paradoxical and self-contradicting. When the fundy agnostic claims that someone cannot know something without absolute knowledge, he's making the kind of claim that he claims you'd have to have absolute knowledge in order to know. In short, agnostics are hypocrites.
So, no, Mr. Fundy Agnostic. I don't want to be "just like you." I don't want to believe that we somehow magically know what everyone else does or doesn't know. When someone says that the believe God exists, or believe God doesn't exist, I don't jump to conclusions and make an ass of myself by assuming that no matter what kind of evidence that person has encountered, and no matter what kind of arguments that person has encountered, that she could not possibly truly know what it is she claims to believe. That, to me, is an irrational position to take. So quit being a jerk to everyone. You're giving agnostics like myself a bad name, and I'm getting sick of it.
Technorati Tags: atheism, agnosticism, god, religion
By my personal definitions, and by the accepted definitions of those within my social circles and most intelligent people I meet, I am both an agnostic and an atheist. So it sometimes infuriates me to see psuedo-dogmatic self-labeled agnostics telling me and other atheists that we're the dogmatic ones and that we have as much faith as any Christian, Muslim, or other religious person. You know the type. He's the jerk that tells everyone that they're wrong in believing whatever it is they believe unless they take the "middle path" that he himself claims to take. He's the one that tells you what it is that you believe and that it's wrong. He claims, as if with some kind of absolute knowledge, that no one can know absolutely (oh, yes, the irony) what the "Truth" is, and therefore, because of this, we know that Agnosticism is the Truth (again, the irony). This is what I light-heartedly call the "fundy agnostic." Beware, fundies, your time is up!
That's right, I'm calling you out. Your era of misinformation, denial, and stupidity is over. Your fundamentalism is coming to an end, agnostics! (Keep an air of humor, here; I'm an agnostic myself and do not mean to stereotype us.) You leave a bad taste in my mouth and I, along with the earth itself, am about to spit you out. You call atheists "fundamentalists" all the time-- but you seem to understand neither atheism nor fundamentalism. Your first problem is your incorrect assumptions that atheists believe that there is no God. The definition of "atheist" that most self-labeled atheists use is "someone who lacks a belief in gods" (the same definition I use, myself). So, right there, you're making an ass of yourself. I'm sorry, but someone had to point it out. It's for your own good, I assure you. After this intervention you can walk away a brighter, happier, more enlightened human being.
Even supposing, for the sake of argument, that an atheist is necessarily someone who believes that there are no gods, you make a gross error, Mr. Fundamentalist Agnostic, in equating this sort of belief with fundamentalism. We believe in lots of things without evidence-- that there is no Santa Claus, there are no leprechauns, no gold at the end of a rainbow, and no invisible pink unicorns. You can't take a single belief someone has and suddenly equate it to "faith" or "fundamentalism."
But, you know, that's not even where my real problem with the fundy agnostic lies. It's when the fundy agnostic claims that someone cannot know with any certainty regarding God's existence. Well, how does the fundy agnostic know that? Does the fundy agnostic have absolute knowledge of everyone's beliefs? Does the fundy agnostic know, with absolute knowledge, that someone does not have absolute knowledge of the universe? Does the fundy agnostic know, with absolute knowledge, that someone doesn't know that God does not exist? How does the fundy agnostic know that the atheist doesn't know for sure? The fundy agnostic would have to have absolute knowledge to know something like that! The fundy agnostic has faith that other people are as clueless as he is about God's existence. But the fundy agnostic doesn't actually know that other people don't know. He simply has faith. The same kind of faith that a Christian has in believing in God.
Enjoying the satire, yet? You see, fundamentalist agnosticism is highly irrational. It is paradoxical and self-contradicting. When the fundy agnostic claims that someone cannot know something without absolute knowledge, he's making the kind of claim that he claims you'd have to have absolute knowledge in order to know. In short, agnostics are hypocrites.
So, no, Mr. Fundy Agnostic. I don't want to be "just like you." I don't want to believe that we somehow magically know what everyone else does or doesn't know. When someone says that the believe God exists, or believe God doesn't exist, I don't jump to conclusions and make an ass of myself by assuming that no matter what kind of evidence that person has encountered, and no matter what kind of arguments that person has encountered, that she could not possibly truly know what it is she claims to believe. That, to me, is an irrational position to take. So quit being a jerk to everyone. You're giving agnostics like myself a bad name, and I'm getting sick of it.
Technorati Tags: atheism, agnosticism, god, religion
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Labels: agnosticism, atheism, god, religion
posted by squarecircle at
7:10 PM
1 Comments:
I think that this brand of agnostic, sadly the most common brand, adopts this position in order to safeguard their faith in certain divine or supernatural aspects to the universe. This way they can draw their own borders on what is irrationally religious and what is ambivalently reasonable to them. Examples would include: karma without Hinduism/Buddhism, Heaven without Christianity, God without scriptural basis and dogma, Jesus being magic but not God, some sort of mass consciousness, angels, psychics, ESP, ghosts, etc...
They do not understand what the term atheism means. Basically, they have succumbed to the religious rhetoric of what they define atheism to be, a faith. Atheism is not the rejection of proven theories, it is the rejection of failed ones. Stating that one is an atheist is not a committed position, it is a statement on current condition. They are confusing atheism with antitheism, such as Satanism.
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