Ok so I'm going to say it

[lizzie_and_ari]

I find The Atheist Bus Campaign really offensive.

Oh yeah she did.

Lxxx

Comments

[daisyflip.livejournal.com]

Hmm...pray tell why?

[henriksdal.livejournal.com]

I thought it was a helpful and interesting way for non-believers to find out about the humanist society, which a lot of people might not know about and be pleased to get more info on.

Personally I find religion massively offensive on a whole range of levels, but hey, what can you do! If only people would stop using it as an excuse for inflicting hatred, suffering and death on a grand scale to vast swathes of humanity across the globe I might be more enamoured toward it.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

I don't really want to jump into this, but one point - the message "There's probably no God" can be, for some people, a really important, positive thing to hear. I do understand that for many other people, the belief that there is a deity is a source of comfort.

[dantesvendetta.livejournal.com]

I actually agree. I'm a happy fuzzy agnostic, and I just see this as antagonistic. It seems like it was made to be controverstial, but maybe that's because I'm not strongly affiliated to anyone. Confusion rules!

Also, their use of the word 'probably' annoys me. And I agree with your below comments about some atheists thinking that their faith (and yes, it's a faith) has a right above all others, and it's sometimes just neatly packaged fundamentalism. You find fundies bloody everywhere!

Also, my beloved believes in God, and he worries less than I do.

Also (I use the word also too much), this comic might make you laugh.

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

I was thinking this morning that perhaps the thing with your and Andy's argument is looking at cost benefit.

He sees more cost in being religious and more benefit in being free from oppression.

I tried on about three different curches on for size, and dint have a great time at the "newer" ones But if I ended up, completely and utterly alone in a city, and all my attempts at making friends failed, I'd probably join a church; I think they do a lot of good things for people. However I have also been subjected to being told that I should feel bad about myself for previous behaviour (being interested in paganism), and I feel if I went to one of those churches in particular now; they'd have a much longer list of things I should be feeling guilty about.

Whereas, I thought you saw more benefit (for some maybe?) to being religious and greater costs to having that removed, or shaken by the atheist bus.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_missfliss_/]

This is the first LJ debate I have bothered to read through in about three years and it was very interesting.

I had just fallen so easily into 'atheist bus campaign GOOD' camp that I and all my philsoc friends naturally occupy, that I had not given much thought to the rightness of it.

I still think the campaign is acceptable but I think Lizzie made some really good points against it, which have tempered my belief in its rightness.

It is worth noting that if you support the atheist bus campaign, you cannot then be angered by pro-religion campaigns. Because that would be double standards. Double standards BAD.