1. The Problem with Atheism

Comment #75689 by filthyatheist on October 3, 2007 at 10:44 am

"You might remember that Thomas Friedman recently wrote an op-ed from Iraq, reporting that some Sunni militias are now fighting jihadists alongside American troops. When Friedman asked one Sunni militant why he was doing this, he said that he had recently watched a member of al-Qaeda decapitate an 8-year-old girl. This persuaded him that the American Crusader forces were the lesser of two evils.

Okay, so even some Sunni militants can discern the boundary between ordinary crazy Islam, and the utterly crazy"

But what Friedman did not tell us was the name of the girl, the village or town where it happened, when it happened or any explanation of a motive.

Doesn't this remind you of the bayoneting of babies by the Huns in the first world war? Isn't it similar to the stories of Iraqi (secularist) soldiers pulling babies from Kuwaiti incubators and leaving them on the floor in 1991. Both these stories were fiction swallowed whole by western media.

Hitchens and Harris are neocon atheists whose contemporary attacks on 'crazy' Islam dovetail nicely with the militarism of the Vulcans in the US administration.

The question they have to answer is why Al Qaeda arises now and not in the previous hundreds of years of Islams existence.

2. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #39178 by filthyatheist on May 10, 2007 at 6:13 am

In case the Karl Rove fan club missed it, from the NYT today:

"...an American officer formally apologized and made compensation payments for civilians who were killed by a Marine special unit that started a series of attacks along a 10-mile stretch of highway...the attacks killed 19 Afghans and wounded 50 more..."

Women and children yet again.

3. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #39176 by filthyatheist on May 10, 2007 at 6:07 am

IQHQ and Thor

Here's a question for the two Bush boys. (Though I notice that you never answer any questions put to you)

Except for their belief in a supernatural god, do you two deep thinkers have any differences with Pat Robertson and Bill O'Reilly.

4. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #39167 by filthyatheist on May 10, 2007 at 5:48 am

IQHQ and Thor

Far from being beaten into submission I have enjoyed crossing swords with such a pair of dimwits. Anyone reading the exchanges can see that you are a couple of Dick Cheney groupies who will swallow any nonsense from the Whitehouse.

You are exposed as moral imbeciles who will accept any slaughter of 'brown children' in the third world.

To show up your smug self-satisfaction at the carnage is reward enough.

Oh and for your further delectation, from this morning's NYT:

"US Airstrikes Kill 21 Civilians" "…the governor of Helmand…said civilians were killed, among them women and children…"

5. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38940 by filthyatheist on May 9, 2007 at 3:26 pm

The thread with Thor and IQHQ has been interesting. It is clear an Atheist political movement or political party is out of the question.

Give me the brave men and women, including clergy, who defend Liberation Theology in Latin American, over warmongering, proto-fascist atheists, any time. Give me the church groups in the US who organized in solidarity with the Sandinista's. Give me the clergy and lay people who marched in Feb. 2003 against the coming holocaust in Iraq.

I prefer someone who believes in God but will not just accept injustice in the world to any atheist moron who thinks that we live in the best of all possible worlds

6. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38852 by filthyatheist on May 9, 2007 at 10:23 am

Thor

OK, I give up. You have got me bang to rights. I am parroting Zinn and Galloway. Whereas, you are obviously an original and profound thinker and have come to your positions independently of the neocons.

But, wait a minute. Galloway and Zinn have got everything about the war absolutely right. And the neocons (and Hitch the Snitch) have got everything about the slaughter absolutely wrong. Totally, disastrously wrong.

Only a wanker like Hitchens continues, against the overwhelming evidence, to claim that there were WMD and a close working relationship between Saddam and Bin Laden.

But you have to choose sides – reality or delusional wankers.

We all know which side you chose.

PS Your ignorance about Hugo Chavez is cosmological.

7. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38785 by filthyatheist on May 9, 2007 at 7:31 am

I agree with the majority of US citizens and the majority of Iraqi citizens that the US should get out immediately. They have no right to be there. They are occupiers.

As to what will happen next, I can't be sure. But neither can IQHQ or the neocons who have got every prediction they made about the war wrong.

The alternative is to keep the slaughter going or introduce a draft.

We know that half a million troops could bring some semblance of order, even at this late date, to Iraq. That would be IQHQs 'pragmatic' solution.

Simple question IQHQ. Do you favour a draft?

8. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38769 by filthyatheist on May 9, 2007 at 6:41 am

From Professor Juan Coles 'Informed Comment' this morning:

"Or also from McClatchy, there is this item: "Around 10.30 am , an American helicopter opened fire on a primary school at Al-Nida ( 9 km north west of Mendli )killing 7 pupils and injuring 3 other pupils with huge damage to the school building."

Must make you proud to be American.

9. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38768 by filthyatheist on May 9, 2007 at 6:31 am

IQHQ

Yes, I admit it my attitude to the war is based on 'sentimental morality'. What's yours based on? Is it 'Hard boiled' realism that alows you to swallow the carnage?

Let's cut to the quick.

Is this war about control of Oil? Or do you discern some more altruistic motivation behind the slaughter?

10. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38756 by filthyatheist on May 9, 2007 at 5:44 am

Harlon57

Kofi Annan, the General Secretary of the UN, said in September 2004 that the Iraq War is illegal. Last month even the ultimate US ally King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia said the war was illegal.

The only reason no court has convicted the US is that they have a veto in the Security Council and refuses to allow itself to be subject to the ICC (world Court).

"The invasion of Iraq was not preemption; it was - like our war on Mexico in 1846 - an avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked war against a foe who posed no immediate threat but whose defeat did offer economic advantages." Michael Scheuer, former head of the CIAs Bin Laden Unit, 'Imperial Hubris'.

This morning's NYT, Page A11: "The only Marine Corps officer who was in Haditha, Iraq, when American troops killed 19 civilians in their homes in 2005 testified at a military hearing on Tuesday that he was "shocked" to find only unarmed people, including women and children among the dead. But he said the marines had not violated any law of war."

Had not violated any law of war!?! So you and Hitchens can continue to support the carnage.

11. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38638 by filthyatheist on May 8, 2007 at 9:32 pm

harlon57

I agree. If you supported the war against nazism you could be said to support the carnage involved.

Hitchens supports the illegal invasion of Iraq. He presumably support the strike on the first night of the war where women and children were slaughtered in the attempt to assassinate the previous US ally and CIA asset Saddam Hussein.

War is horrible. But this war in Iraq is horrible, illegal, unnecessary and immoral.

12. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38628 by filthyatheist on May 8, 2007 at 8:42 pm

Hey, William can you supply a reference where Hitchens has made "vociferous criticisms' of the use of napalm in Iraq? I'd like to take a look at it.

William, I am not a pacifist. If I support a war (say the sandinista war to get rid of Somosa) then I accept that there will be 'collateral damage' and that innocent people and children will be killed. I will support the 'carnage' and accept that I support it. To say that I support the "worst abuses of the war" is correct and no 'straw man'.

You have to differentiate between the violence of the oppressed and the violence of the oppressors. We know which side Hitchens is on these days.

13. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton: A Debate God Is Not Great

Comment #38616 by filthyatheist on May 8, 2007 at 6:59 pm

Catchy Nick is quite right about Hitchens. Do William and IQHQ not believe that napalm is being used in Iraq? Do they not realize that the NYTs reports on its front page that US war planes are firing into built-up urban areas in Baghdad. Which is a War Crime.

Robert Fisk, on his last appearance on Democracy Now, describes arriving at the scene of a massacre where US troops, who had been hit by an IED, opened up with tanks on all civilian cars in case they were 'hostiles'. Fisk says there were children covered with carpets all over the place and women, dead in the back of cars, naked, with their clothes blown off.

And what ever you think of Hitchens debating skills, he supports this carnage.

14. Interview with Pierre Rehov

Comment #37802 by filthyatheist on May 5, 2007 at 6:56 pm

The problem with this analysis is that the Tamil Tigers were the first group to develop the suicide bomber, in the modern era, and they are secular. Putatively Marxist. (see Robert A. Pape, 'Dying to Win' - up to 2003 the Tigers carried out more bombings than Hamas or Islamic Jihad)

Iraq had never had any suicide bombers at all before the illegal invasion.

Curiously, this video and some of Sam Harris' writing (and all of Christopher Hitchens bumptious ravings) nicely dovetail with the propaganda needs of the present US/UK warmongers.

15. Lou Dobbs Interviews Christopher Hitchens

Comment #37512 by filthyatheist on May 4, 2007 at 5:17 pm

No European, who has not witnessed it for themselves, could possibly believe how racist Dobbs show is. Everynight, for years, he has been promoting explicitly facsist propaganda against Mexicans and other Hispanics.

He accuses them of bringing crime and disease to the US; stealing American jobs; being rapists, drug dealers and murderers. Night after night after night. It is like 'Der Strummer' brought to TV.

The sight of this racist xenophope pinning a US flag lapel onto the inebriate warmongerer Hitchens, should turn the stomach of any decent person.

16. In Ducks, War of the Sexes Plays Out in the Evolution of Genitalia

Comment #37041 by filthyatheist on May 3, 2007 at 8:39 am

A corkscrewed phallus the length of their body and they have to do it in the equivalent of a canoe!!

What marvellous little creatures.

Although, I advise them to avoid behavioural ecologists or perverted butchers as they are more accurately known.

17. In Ducks, War of the Sexes Plays Out in the Evolution of Genitalia

Comment #37038 by filthyatheist on May 3, 2007 at 8:27 am

"Their lower oviduct is spiraled like the male phallus, for example, but it turns in the opposite direction."

This can't be right!!

Even a first year engineering student could tell you that if this was correct then ducks would be extinct.

18. In Ducks, War of the Sexes Plays Out in the Evolution of Genitalia

Comment #37037 by filthyatheist on May 3, 2007 at 8:22 am

1st mallard to 2nd mallard: "go take a flying ****"

2nd mallard: "aerodynamically impossible, old boy"

19. The Video: Bill O'Reilly Interviews Richard Dawkins

Comment #34305 by filthyatheist on April 23, 2007 at 7:04 pm

here is an interesting snippet from the Zuckerman study Billo mentioned at this site:

http://www.pitzer.edu/academics/faculty/zuckerman/atheism.html

"What accounts for the staggering differences between nations in terms of rates of non-belief? Why do most nations in Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia contain almost no atheists, but within many European nations atheists are in abundance? There are numerous explanations (Zuckerman, 2004; Paul, 2002; Stark and Finke, 2000; Bruce, 1999). One leading theory comes from Norris and Inglehart (2004), who argue that in societies characterized by plentiful food distribution, excellent public healthcare, and widely accessible housing, religiosity wanes. Conversely, in societies where food and shelter are scarce and life is generally less secure, religious belief is strong. This is not a new theory (Thrower, 1999). For example, Karl Marx (1843) argued that people who suffer in oppressive social conditions are apt to turn to religion for comfort."

Doh!

20. Pope abolishes limbo

Comment #34035 by filthyatheist on April 23, 2007 at 4:51 am

"He has approved the document drafted by the International Theological Commission, the panel's secretary told reporters, adding however that its conclusions were not to be considered Roman Catholic Church dogma."

Err...so what's the party line now? Do we fenians have to believe this or can we just ignore it, like condoms.

21. Here Comes the Fourth Musketeer.

Comment #33696 by filthyatheist on April 21, 2007 at 7:08 am

You can't be a GOOD atheist and be a rightwing, warmongering, nutjob like Hitchens.

His abrupt apostasy from progressive politics should be a warning.

In a couple of years we could be looking at a modern Malcolm Muggeridge.

22. Dinesh D'Souza says I don't exist: an atheist at Virginia Tech

Comment #33291 by filthyatheist on April 19, 2007 at 7:49 pm

Amen

23. Where Is Atheism When Bad Things Happen?

Comment #33284 by filthyatheist on April 19, 2007 at 7:37 pm

Dinesh D'Souza's latest book was called 'The Enemy at Home". In it he proposed a pact between right wing nutjobs in the US with right wing nutjobs in the Islamic world who share the same values.

Here is an extract from the devastating review in the New York Times Book Review by Alan Wolfe:-

" So let this "decent" liberal make perfectly clear how thoroughly indecent Dinesh D'Souza is. Like his hero Joe McCarthy, he has no sense of shame. He is a childish thinker and writer tackling subjects about which he knows little to make arguments that reek of political extremism. His book is a national disgrace..."

24. NEXT MONDAY: Bill O'Reilly interviews Richard Dawkins

Comment #33187 by filthyatheist on April 19, 2007 at 2:28 pm

I just had a look at the two Sam Harris clips. You can see how O'Reilly would go for Sam's sweeping attack on Islam.

If Richard is going on to talk about 'The God Delusion' O'Reilly will undoubtedly be more aggressive.

Fox News is what Nazi TV would have been like, today, if they hadn't been beaten in the second world war. Anti-nazi's should boycott it.

25. NEXT MONDAY: Bill O'Reilly interviews Richard Dawkins

Comment #33172 by filthyatheist on April 19, 2007 at 2:09 pm

O'Reilly really is a bampot, prepared to shout down his victims/guests, at the drop of a hat, if he doesn't like what they say or if they stand up to his bullying.

Richard could make a bigger splash by publically dumping the O'Reilly interview and going on Keith Olberman's Countdown show on MSNBC. O'Reilly hates Keith and it would be a big news story in here in the US.

26. Even non-believers must recognise the moral necessity of Christianity

Comment #30757 by filthyatheist on April 9, 2007 at 5:25 pm

"...too many of us are infested with vulgar Marxism. So when believers who are angry with us talk about their faith, we assume that this is a mere metaphor for political and economic grievances"

As one 'infested with vulgar Marxism' myself, the above point seems to be Anderson's only reason for penning the whole fatutous piece.

Here is what Michael Scheuer, the head of the CIA's Bin Laden Unit between 1996 - 1999, and very far from being a 'vulgar Marxist', says on page 240 of his book 'Imperial Hubris'.

"The US is hated across the Islamic world because of specific US government policies and actions...we are at war...to defend those policies and not, as President Bush mistakenly has said, "to defend freedom and all that is good and just in the world."

Err...he appears to be saying that, " talk about their faith..is a mere metaphor for political and economic grievances"

27. Militant atheists: too clever for their own good

Comment #30346 by filthyatheist on April 7, 2007 at 6:47 pm

"It therefore matters not only how we reason, but how we feel, how we act towards others, how we speak, sing, dance, laugh, cry, eat and wash, how we die, how we pray and how we love."

Can anyone hazard a guess as to why it matters how we wash?!?