How can atheists be so inconsistent?

It's not uncommon to hear people from the 'atheist movement' complain about the usage of 'anno domini (Iesu Christi), AD' and 'before christ, BC' and them instead prefer the religiously neutral 'common era'. They also complain about 'in god we trust' as a motto.

seemingly these chaps are opposed to religious associations posioning their life, but what about the non christian religious references? Are they equally annoyed that the days of the week are named after germanic and roman gods? Are they horrified that 'sunday' and 'monday' refer to solar and lunar worship? No, they seem very calm about that even though they come into contact with the days' names on a daily basis (hoho) and relatively seldom encounter AD and BC. I suspect that they're either ignorant of that, or that they're just anti-christian.

As for the motto part: Does it hurt anyone? are you, as a non-believer or non-christian, feeling opressed that there a reference to a religion you don't believe in? If that's the case, man up. But other than that, can't you realise that christianity is a huge part of said country's heritage and history? Do you expect them to just ignore that they're a christian nation and have historically always been? Sweden has a cross in its flag, switzerland has a psalm as its anthem, et cetera. Do you want us to change flags and anthems too? It's exactly the same thing as with the motto: A religious reference to our history and heritage that isn't really hurting anyone.

What I want you people to do is to realise that religion is everywhere and you can't get rid of it. And to realise that it's a pointless goal anyways.

 

You must be dreadfully clever to be smarter than the people who think and believe such stupid things as you are imagining.

 

So, how many Roman pagans have been trying to get you to offer a goat sacrifice to Jupiter?

 

wow, that sentence just confused the (*)(*)(*)(*) out of me for some reason. I'm an agnostic atheist myself if that's what you were talking about. But I will clarify that I'm talking about the vocal atheist who identify as atheist and go around bashing religion and christianity in particular. The dawkins and hitchens fans you know, those militant atheists.

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none, how many christians have forced you to eat and drink the symbolic blood and flesh of christ?

 

None. Now then, why doesn't anyone use Sunday or Monday to worship? They don't use it to worship the gods. It's just a day of the week that the English language has corrupted to mean something else. Humans are really good at language, it's what we do to when we have to communicate.

 

Why does it matter that there's still followers of that religion around or not? Can't we say anno domini because there's people who really believe in that dominum? why can't AD just be another 'corrupted word' just like thursday? And by the way, there's actually a few norse pagans here and there, a few in the states. Oh no, that means there's actually some people who believe in frigg, thor, tyr and odin! Quickly, rename the days!!

 

Because AD is a word that's more familar in the west, then let's say the east. It's like a common name for a dog. We call it dog, but someone else might call it a perro. By having a language that unifies us (BCE, CE), it helps to prevent confusion. The reason we use those weekdays' names, are due to religion, but they were corrupted into meaning the days of a week. That's it.

 

I honestly don't mind the use of AD and BC though I can see why some people are in favor of not using religious doctrines that are currently being practiced as the basis for terminology, I would never suggest though that a private citizen should be punished or ostracized for using such terminology though. I think the reason for this particular objection is that there are very many people(atheists or even just secularists) who feel saturated by all of the religion they see around them if they live in places like the bible belt, which leads them to feel like they need to keep things that have no need of being associated with religion to be just that; unassociated with religion.

As for the controversy surrounding "In God We Trust", it is more of a matter of principle. The United States may well be a country has, and has always had a christian majority, and a long history that is very much affected by that majority; but the country was founded with the principle of separation of church and state. A principle which many Atheists and secularists in the country are very grateful for considering that they are the most hated minority group in that country, and a principle without which many fear that christian mobs would be burning down the houses of any open atheists. Realize that maybe in Europe Christianity has become more of a meek ideology which for the most part accepts that people have differing opinions from itself, but in the United States Christianity is more than just a religion; is a way of life which enthusiastically creates in groups and out groups and then ostracizes and bullies those out groups. So really the use of "In God We Trust" is a frightening slippery slope to many.

 

Really, this is so ridiculous. Name the last atheist who got beaten up or had his house burned down by a Christian mob.

If you're going to get all paranoid that's your problem, but don't present your paranoid fantasies as rational argument because it isn't.

 

AD is an abbrevation of anno domini, which is two words.

In my view, it's more confusion to rename is to 'common era' simply because there's nothing common binding together the two thousand years after christ's birth (even though it's slightly off mark) other than the birth of christ. AD tells us what we're really talking about: Years that have passed since the brith of the lord (of the christians), unlike CE which is just confusing and unjustified.

AD might be a bit alien to the rest of the world, but isn't yoga alien to the west? Should we rename yoga to something withouth hindu associations, and force the indians to do it too, just like we're doing with AD? In my view the culture that came up with something and from whom other adopted it should name the thing in question. Indians came up with yoga so they get to choose the name, the west came up with our date system and thus gets to choose name. isn't that fair?

The days of the weeks are still religious in nature even if the religion is long dead and the words a bit corrupted. Just like the years are the lord's years in our date system, the days are the gods' days. It's really not any different at all.

 

My entire point is that it is precisely because of the separation of church and state that no atheists are being lynched. That in that past Christians felt secure enough in the environment of mutual doctrinal support to spread their religion violently is historically true. Whether or not they would do the same today if they felt they could is a question for a sociologist or a psychologist, but if you were in an atheists shoes; would you want to give them the chance?

 

Yoga is a word that comes from India, so why not keep it? Language doesn't work that way, it's just a bunch of words that we said had meaning to them. the only way to get a word to change it's meaning, is if a lot of people took it that way. AD doesn't mean anything, it's just an artifical barrier that we made. Just make it secular, because it serves a secular purpose.

So when it's Sunday, I should go out and pray to the Sun? Or should I enjoy it as a day off? I'm going to enjoy it as a day to relax because that's what Sunday is, the 7th day of the week. It might have served some purpose in the past, but that's it. The past. Words change meaning over time, and weekdays, months, heck even years lose their religious meaning.

 

I suppose living in a severly religious area like the bible belt and being stigmatised for being an atheist does make people view religion in a very negative light, but I think they should think a bit more and realise that their own grieviances doesn't justify having a nation deny it's heritage, nor does it justify judging religion based on the actions of those few.

separation of church and state is actually more about keeping government out of the church so it's not corrupted, as the anglican church was (in the views of the founding fathers), and not about keeping faith based initiatives out of government. The founders were clear about religion being important. They thought, and I agree, that a religion which keeps the people moral and sound is good. And a people need be moral to govern itself.

 

AD is the name for the most popular of the western date systems, so why not keep it? AD is already secular: it simply means years passed since the birth of the lord of the christians. and that's exactly what we are counting the years from; not some 'common era'. There doesn't exist a common era from year zero til now in any other way than being unified by being after the birth of christ. If you think the wording isn't secular, what about the year is counting from? Unless you change it to something else you'll never get away from that it's counting from jesus' birth. Also, yoga also has religious associations, why the double standard? Why not make it secular?

No, you shouldn't praise the sun. all it means is that's it's the sun's day, just like this year is the 2013th year since jesus was born, and that doesn't mean you have to praise jesus either. Sunday is only the day off because of christianity. Want to abolish this unsecular day off too? I don't get this you're saying that 'it's old, doesn't mean anything anymore'. How isn't it the same as AD? If sunday can just mean sunday why can't ad just mean ad?

 

There seems to be a rash of worried Christians that people are recognizing they aren't the only people who matter so they are whining to the world.

 

1. Yes, the definition of the word secular:
" is already secular: it simply means years passed since the birth of the lord of the christians."

That isn't secular. CE, however is.

2. Because our Yoga has it's own properties that differ from the Sanskrit meaning. Yoga is a religious ritual in Hinduism, here it's used as a way to relax onceself. It's different from it's religious roots.

Sunday means Sunday. AD means AD. However there are words out there that mean the same thing. CE and AD mean the same thing, however CE is secular, so it makes more sense to use it for History, because History is secular.

 

Is being christian really the main point of all American culture though? Even If it were no one is denying Christians the right to put giant Christmas decorations on their own homes, churches, or really any privately owned property. The Idea of separation of church and state is as much a cultural staple as Christianity is, and the idea that "Congress shall make no law respecting and establishment of religion" is just as much of a driving force in the founding principles of the USA as the puritanical values which led the puritans to reject the Anglican church. Also I'm not so sure that all of the founding fathers were as religious as you claim they were; Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison alone are known to have been against the whole notion of faith and established religion, though they were mostly deists and not atheists.

 

'karma' is an indian word with religious associations. Is it called karma by it's original indian name because indians dominate the world? No, because we don't mind the words being indian and referring to indian religions. AD, referring to christianity, should be called by it's original name for the same reasons karma and yoga are.

 

I don't get what you're trying to say here.

Doesn't AD have other non-religious properties like being the international date system, just like yoga has non religious use? And yet both are clearly associated with religion. You're not making a good argument here.

I want you to adress that CE is a meaningless pair of words that doesn't make any sense. And yes they do mean the same thing, only that CE is confusing and AD is the original. It ain't broke, don't fix it, especially not with such a bad alternative as CE. And CE still isn't anymore secular than AD because it's still counting from christ's birth.

 

You defined something secular, though you admit it has a religious meaning. That's not secular.

It's the purpose for what it's being used. AD has a religious connotation to history. Yoga has come to mean stretching.

You're right, if it ain't broken why fix it? Since everything in the west uses Jesus' birth as it's turning point date, keep it as such. However History is secular, so keep it secular. Give it a secular connotation.

 

No but it's a big part of it american culture. As I said the idea of separation of church and state is more about keeping government out of religion rather than the other way around. The founding fathers were against religion, but against established religion which they viewed as corrupt and corrupting the good values. Which is why they didn't want a state church because they wanted the churches to be free and uncorrupt so the population would be good and moral.

 

In that it refers to the birth of an historical person, who just happened to be a prophet, it's indeed secular. look at it this way: we simply decided to count the years from some random guy, and he just happened to to be the messiah of a big religion.

It's now being used to count years. It's as distanced from it's original religious roots as yoga and karma are. Just like people don't think about ganesh when they do some yoga, people don't think about Jesus when they see it's year 2013.

History isn't anymore or less secular than anything else, so why bother? Why not use what they used before? And I've already explained how CE still refers to jesus' birth, and how AD can be viewed as secular to begin with.

 

He was religious, hence AD. But since we're looking at his effect on society and not religion, it makes it secular, so CE would be better.

Yeah, they're secular.

History is secular. We're not being indoctrinated into a religion by studying the effects of it on civilizations. Historians just need to see the effects of it on society. We just use it, because there's no need to switch out everything, and make a new secular system up.

 

Because he was religious? Are you saying it's only secular to refer to atheists? If we're going by his effect on society and the world you should make that C stand for christian instead of common. Atleast that would make sense, as it was indeed the beginning of the christian era. And I ask you, what exactly is common about the common era?

So why not just use AD?

 

Complain? I wouldn't call it that. Poisoned? Not me. Annoyed? Wouldn't say so. Horrified? Don't be silly. Oppressed? Haha, no. You're over-egging it.

Would it be slightly NICE to get rid of religious associations on everything? Yeah, a tiny bit. Not enough to get hot under the collar about, especially considering that even in my notably-irreligious country, full-on atheists are still in the minority. And yes, I do mean everything, within reason. I knew about the days of the week, and I'm actually a fan of the decimal calendar concept although there seem wrinkles to be ironed out in that idea. Although as I'm sure others have pointed out, having influences from ancient history that affects nothing, is rather different than contemporary influences that also affect world politics.