Trolling Tide Turning? God-people trolling

Gordon

Is it just me that's noticing a lot more religious folk troll atheists these days?

example

I remember some years ago, Christianity forums were trolled by Atheists quite a bit, and the religious folk didn't seem to enter into atheist discussions except to try their hand at converting people, but it's different now. I'm getting the impression that religious folk are getting a bit annoyed at the swell of atheism in the recent years, and are trying to bite back by doing a bit of the auld trolling (like above).

I think it's quite a significant marker to be honest, in a way I'm really chuffed that this shift has happened, as it's just one more step closer to religion disappearing off the planet

Is it just me that's been thinking this?

Sarky

Well, they're certainly trying.

But so far it's ended up like any phenomenon that religious folk try to co-opt. Like with Christian Rock, there's something missing from Christian Trolling. Let's call it "soul", for the sake of, ahem, argument.

Gordon

They god no soul in their troll eh?!

philologos

What is trolling in your view? Is it simply criticising atheism or something more?

Given that Christianity is growing worldwide - I wouldn't say it's disappearing just yet by any means.

Gordon

philologos wrote: »

What is trolling in your view? Is it simply criticising atheism or something more?

Trolling. Check the link I gave above

philologos

The word is often bandied around, and I've seen the link posted above. You've claimed that this was common rather than once off. I just want to understand better what you mean.

ed2hands

That wasn't trolling though. Taken up wrong more like..

Sonics2k

philologos wrote: »

What is trolling in your view? Is it simply criticising atheism or something more?

Given that Christianity is growing worldwide - I wouldn't say it's disappearing just yet by any means.

This is a good example.
It was clearly set up to get a bit of a rage fest going, link to prove how wrong he was etc and was not set up to the purpose the OP claimed was it's reason.

There was already a few threads up at the time he could of posted on, but intentionally chose to make a thread he knew would get a stronger reaction.

e.g trolling.

Zombrex

ed2hands wrote: »

That wasn't trolling though. Taken up wrong more like..

Yeah I'm in too minds about whether Anti meant the phrase as it came across.

From previous discussions with him I would imagine not.

We certainly do have some genuine trolls though, and I would say to anyone on this forum the same thing I would say on the Christian forum, you don't have to answer them unless you want to.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

What is trolling in your view? Is it simply criticising atheism or something more?

Anti's post, particularly the taking Christ out of Xmas bit, was taken as a slightly snide or double sided complement.

Bit like me saying "To all those who wish atheist would go to hell, a merry Christmas"

Now, I'm not sure Anti meant it like that, but as it came across it certainly seemed a bit trollish.

Sarky

Gordon wrote: »

They god no soul in their troll eh?!

To be perfectly honest, I don't think many of them really believe in trolling. They just go through the motions, but that special something is just missing from it, and can't be copied by a non-believer.

Poor guys.

Galvasean

philologos wrote: »

Given that Christianity is growing worldwide - I wouldn't say it's disappearing just yet by any means.

In horrible places like Uganda. But wait, they do bad things so they aren't proper Christians.... but we're growing!!!!

edit: Now THAT's trollin'!

philologos

Christians in Uganda are Christians in Uganda. Some may have the wrong idea about forcing all those around them to believe everything, that tends to have disastrous results, rather than recognising that Christianity is a grass-roots movement people try to make Christianity a political entity.

Indeed, that's trollin', but I'm not going to take the bait sir! :pac:

Galvasean

The murdering of homosexuls in Uganda is purely a political entity. Nothin' to do with the Bible so?

RichieC

not new. anyone who follows science news and watches science videos on youtubr knows they get into the comments and destroy any useful discussions with their anti science rubbish.

philologos

The political demonisation of LGBT people in Uganda is a distortion of the Christian gospel. Jesus died for our sins, why on earth would I or any other Christian have the authority to put anyone else to death as a result. Any Christian I feel who would be advocating this view needs to be reminded of Christ's grace.

Dades

Gordon wrote: »

Is it just me that's noticing a lot more religious folk troll atheists these days?

I'm not sure I've seen a big increase recently. There's a few regulars that have been cropping up in the last couple of years.

Adds a certain 'balance' to the place in that freedom of speech is seen to be given to all.

antiskeptic

Zombrex wrote: »

Yeah I'm in too minds about whether Anti meant the phrase as it came across.

Thank you for your vote of confidence



Let me elaborate..

Joyeux Noel was a film about an incident in World War 1, where opposing sides laid down arms for a Christmas truce so as to share something that is more important and vital that whatever the momentary struggle happens to be - namely, their shared humanity.

In that case, WW1 was the momentary struggle. In our case, it's a war of words concerning worldviews.

In that context, there should be no issue with labelling collective-you as those who would seek to take Christ out of Christmas. The death of religion and the secularisation of society is a repeated stated focus of very many in this forum afterall.

Notwithstanding that stated of aim of collective-yours, one which I seek to oppose, I can, in a moment of laying down of arms, wish peace be upon collective-you too. It's only a momentary thing - we'll be back in business before too long.

Gordon wrote:

Is it just me that's noticing a lot more religious folk troll atheists these days?

Set your antennae to 'subtlety detection' and you might avoid spamming the forum with false troll alerts. (this statement being an example of an actual Trollism)

pH

antiskeptic wrote: »

Set your antennae to 'subtlety detection' and you might avoid spamming the forum with false troll alerts.

Happy Holidays ..
..to all who would shove Christ down our throats at this time of year. In the hope that there will peace on earth for you all too at this time..

robindch

Gordon wrote: »

I'm getting the impression that religious folk are getting a bit annoyed at the swell of atheism in the recent years, and are trying to bite back

That's true, but I think the reason lies elsewhere.

From my interactions Here and There over the last six/seven years, I believe that the religions are losing most heavily (at least in rich countries with high levels of education) from the ranks of what might be termed the "idle middle", the people who deem themselves religious mostly for social reasons. This leaves, I believe, people with more extreme religious views, who, now lacking the social inertia provided by what was the idle middle, have formed successively more cohesive ingroups which provide fertile grounds for feeding In-group–out-group bias, Collective narcissism and other unhealthy social traits. These fragmentary groups are likely to continue to shrink, as their beliefs become more and more self-centered and untenable.

One side-effect of this tendency towards extremism is an increased sense of the necessity for propagation, for outgroup persecution (qv, Dana's bullet-ridden car tyre) etc. Another side effect of this lack of social restraint, is that small, unhinged religious groupings, such as the 9/11 hijackers, are going to continue to engage in what I suppose could be referred to, drily, as "indiscriminate high-profile actions". I think it was in Algeria, where one group of religious extremists determined that every citizen in the state was an apostate and cheerfully murdered as they wished (up until, AFAIR, they imploded when one group member realized that everybody else in the group was an apostate, and killed the lot).

Adam Curtis' The Power of Nightmares discusses some of the above, although not generally in these terms.

lmaopml

Atheists have pretty much always existed, it's not a new phenomena to be an atheist or somebody who asks questions etc. The new generation are nothing more than the new generation, the same way as those of faith are the next generation in faith. One of the most quoted atheists seems to be Epicurus, among the new generation of atheists who has been made popular due to the next generations recent writings.

Trolling is nothing new either, it's something that arose with the freedom of speech that the internet allows - It's a fine art trying to recognise it though, and the term is thrown about far too freely imo too.

Sonics2k

lmaopml wrote: »

Atheists have pretty much always existed, it's not a new phenomena to be an atheist or somebody who asks questions etc. The new generation are nothing more than the new generation, the same way as those of faith are the next generation in faith. One of the most quoted atheists seems to be Epicurus, among the new generation of atheists who has been made popular due to the next generations recent writings.

Trolling is nothing new either, it's something that arose with the freedom of speech that the internet allows - It's a fine art trying to recognise it though, and the term is thrown about far too freely imo too.

I will admit the amount of people willing to admit to being Atheist/Agnostic has greatly increased over the last few decades.

As education has grown, science has progressed and the world has moved on, people have learned to question various beliefs they or their parents had. Noticed the similarities between numerous religions, but are sceptical about the fact even they can't really agree on anything.

It's hard for me personally, to accept something as true, when even the people preaching it argue with each other about it.
That and frankly, most holy books make no real sense.

lmaopml

Perhaps the amount of people willing to admit being atheist now is greater Sonic, that's probably to be expected along with so many things, alongside this imo so too has a type of pop style proselytising - and I don't mean to cause offense to the residents of the forum, but imo this is true too.

I have nothing against people questioning and finding out who they are, I think that's good. I think it's a pretty cool age to live in.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

The political demonisation of LGBT people in Uganda is a distortion of the Christian gospel. Jesus died for our sins, why on earth would I or any other Christian have the authority to put anyone else to death as a result. Any Christian I feel who would be advocating this view needs to be reminded of Christ's grace.

The only problem with that is the Christian doctrine of removing those who sin from your society.

Now don't get me wrong, what is happening in places like Uganda is still a gross distortion of what Paul was talking about. But that is part of the problem. Paul thought the end times were upon us. These are not plans for living century to century. Or to put it another way, Paul was not thinking how are centuries of people going to act on my words.

Unfortunately the idea that the presence of sinful behaviour will corrupt others to sin, and thus people must be shielded and protected from exposure to this sinful behaviour, is something found throughout Christian history, and even today in the West is used to justify sanctions against the acceptance of homosexuality in society.

It is taken to a murderous extreme in places like Uganda, far beyond anything I believe Paul would have sanctioned. But teaching this sort of seperationist dogma and then expecting that no one takes it that far is naive in my mind.

robindch

philologos wrote: »

The political demonisation of LGBT people in Uganda is a distortion of the Christian gospel.

Nonetheless it happens.

A few days back, AFAIR, you said that you were not concerned by what christianity produced in practice -- is this still the case?

Cicero

Trolling goes back to the time of Ancient Greece- it was known back then as sophistry. Socrates was accused of (wrongly) and ultimately put to death for, being a sophist.

A sophist is someone who, through clever use of language and rhetoric, decieves others into believing fallacy.
I imagine the accusation of sophistry rides high against Christians in this forum, but I've no doubt the accusation exists equally towards athieists in the Christian forum too.

The modern definition of a sophist is one who manipulates the opponents Prejudices and emotions to overcome their logical fallacies- which I would say is as pretty close to a troll definition as you can get...

But it could be argued that this is also the over riding feeling you get when an Athiest and Christian come head to head on a discussion forum.

dixiefly

Gordon wrote: »

Is it just me that's noticing a lot more religious folk troll atheists these days?

example

I think it's quite a significant marker to be honest, in a way I'm really chuffed that this shift has happened, as it's just one more step closer to religion disappearing off the planet

Wow!
You attempt to conclude from a thread written to wish seasons greetings that religion is finally on the way out. The words jumping to conclusions spring to mind!

Is this not the kind of approach to making a conclusion based on tenuous information that atheists have a big problem with?

Also, if you had a problem with the other thread could you not just post your points on that thread?

antiskeptic

Zombrex wrote: »

Unfortunately the idea that the presence of sinful behaviour will corrupt others to sin, and thus people must be shielded and protected from exposure to this sinful behaviour, is something found throughout Christian history, and even today in the West is used to justify sanctions against the acceptance of homosexuality in society.

God's interest in separating his people from depravity runs as strongly under the new convenant as it did when mirrored by the old. In the old he wiped out nations, in the new he instructs those who wilfully engage in depravity be excised. For the good of the flock.

That men distort God's truth and wisdom (for his people) unto monasticism or the actions of those in Nigeria is the fault of men. Not God's truth.

Your argument might hold for one who supposes the bible just another political manifesto. But to suppose God's desire for his people should bow to the sin-bent tendencies of men?

That's a failure to understand the overarching purpose and authority and holiness of God (even for the sake of discussion).

MrPudding

antiskeptic wrote: »

In the old he wiped out nations, in the new he instructs those who wilfully engage in depravity be excised. For the good of the flock.

And how does one "excise" the depraved?

MrP

Sonics2k

MrPudding wrote: »

And how does one "excise" the depraved?

MrP

What people like antiskeptic want to believe is this.

If it's good, then it's God's good grace.
If it's bad, then it's Man's fault.

Zombrex

antiskeptic wrote: »

God's interest in separating his people from depravity runs as strongly under the new convenant as it did when mirrored by the old. In the old he wiped out nations, in the new he instructs those who wilfully engage in depravity be excised. For the good of the flock.

Well yes, that is the point. Some of the blame for this sort of behaviour rests on the Bible.

For example, when the Oregon School Board fire a teacher for being gay they are not distorting the message of the Bible. They are in fact following it.

antiskeptic wrote: »

That men distort God's truth and wisdom (for his people) unto monasticism or the actions of those in Nigeria is the fault of men. Not God's truth.

Well God doesn't exist, so I agree we cannot blame him for this

We can though critically look at how separationist dogma leads, unsurprisingly, to people being separated and persecuted. Christians may say something like "Oh its ok, it is what God wants so it is fine" but that, needless to say, means nothing to me or a great deal of people.

antiskeptic wrote: »

Your argument might hold for one who supposes the bible just another political manifesto. But to suppose God's desire for his people should bow to the sin-bent tendencies of men?

That is again the point, the authors of the Bible didn't want their fellow Jews or Christians to tolerate sinful behaviour. They wanted it removed, often violently, from society so that it would not corrupt others.