Christian Embargo on Religious Forum

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1

I’m declaring a Christian Embargo on any future discussions in the fake part of the site, the ‘religious section’ as it has systematically suppressed discussion on Christianity positively, is ran by a Atheist, and locks up or moves discussions that upset anyone with Anti-Christian views, but certainly not vice versa, which is obvious to anyone looking at the few wack-job posts there.

Simply put, Im calling for non-interaction there by Christians. This site has shown a fear of Christians, Jews, and Mislims while embracing Gnostics, anti-Christian Atheists, Neo-Pagan and Vaishnav Prejudice.

Muslims and Jews get bombed more than Christians on this forum, but Im calling it quits for the Christians, declaring an all out blockade until this eventually is resolved, including a moderator who is a believer in at least something other than fuck Christianity. Ild take a Wiccan Priestess over that silliness.

It’s sad considering how active Christians are in philosophy and in intellectual circles around the world that none bother to post here, even though pound to pound thinking wise the vast majority of intellectuals are religious the world over. It’s time for a change, anything less encourages this abuse and thought apartheid. I’ve put up with it for a long time, it’s time to call it out. No more discussions. That forum isn’t representative of most anyone, anywhere, and plays everything one sided. That forum is illegitimate from here on out.

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You have my full support in this embargo. That said, I don’t think you improve a forum by witholding good posts. I’m of mixed feelings about it, but it seems like a principled stand, and so I support it.

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Uh, you’re not being ironic, are you? :wink:

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I Think it would be better to focus on the unjust treatment - or really keep doing it and in a very specific example way. I am not a Christian, but I have backed up and been critical of various positions taken by Christians here and in other forums - likewise other Abrahamists. I realize you likely are still not Reading me - an embargo I also respect in the abstract, given that I have people on foe here - but if you are and you start a thread giving examples of where you see the mod being unfair, I will scrutinize with vigor and be happy to support you instances I agree with you on.

At some Point philosophy (online certainly) became science as hallucinated by lay science groupiesand it is really messing up philosophy and, well, also Life.

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Moreno has spoken justly. I am not a Christian either. I suppose technically that I’m an “Abrahamist”, although I have never thought of it that way. It sounds odd. Anyways, I am also prepared to scrutinize with vigor.

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CN, moderation of the religion forum is criticized by Christians for being pro-atheist, and by atheists for being pro-christian. I don’t mean to dismiss your perception, just to provide some context. And I will of course review any examples you can provide.

That’s a powerful description, I like it. While I think science and philosophy are deeply linked (they were after all synonyms at one time), it is right to criticize any position that forgets that modern science is a subset of philosophy, and not the other way around.

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This complaint is probably on par with ANY person with their own philosophical slant posting on the philosophy section, being disagreed with and having their threads locked up or moved, and then complaining that the forum is against their philosophical slant when the moderation was just about bad/objectionable quality posting and nothing to do with any “movement” for which they were showing support.

Of course pulling the religion card is a powerful one, just like the race card etc. I call bullshit.

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I’d just like some specific examples to put this in context, and maybe to hear what the moderator in question has to say about his decisions. With only one side’s position present, and not in any specific context, it’s hard to tell what’s really going on.

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One example of moderation that CN is probably talking about is the Animal Chakras thread being moved to Hall of Questions, I think.
I don’t see that that one has anything at all to do with Christianity in particular, and I think Felix isn’t unreasonable to demand more from an OP than just a link followed by “comments?”

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If you say ‘Christianity’ or ‘Jesus’ in the Religion Forum, then someone will post negative comments which are often unproductive or unrelated to the thread.

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I have found that many of the people who come here and question Christianity do so with no intent to give the answers they receive any real consideration.

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I Think there is a lot of overlap between Science and Philosophy and I am certainly not saying that scientific empiricist challenges to assertions should be ruled out. But often, it seems, if one cannot produce what often naively gets called proof - iow, oddly, backing by scientific consensus - then one is told one is merely speculating - and that this is damning, of course - or worse. One implicit conclusion is that that epistemological issues have all been decided. Another that one should only state or explore what can be demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt (to a majority of the scientific Community, I guess). Another that philosophical discussions should basically be abstracts for peer reviewed scientific publications. Another that Everything that can be discussed has been or must be able to be researched by science. There are more. And of course the idea that philosophy could ever offer a critique of interpretations of data by scientists is beyond the pale, since scientists are also all well trained in philosophy and cannot make paradigmatic or model-based errors (or have problems due to naivte about philosophy of language issues, etc.). In fact, really the process of creating models is transparent and obvious. Hence data to models (read:metaphysics) is foolproof. One irony is that the theist William of Occam is often whipped out in an appeal to authority that through a nice sleight of mind assumes he was a making an apriori ontological claim about reality. Actually there are a great number of ironies in there.

Add all this together and couple it with the (really quite understandable) anger against religion in general and Christianity in particular amongst many lay philosophers in the West, and the signal to noise ration can be rather poor in threads in religion forums in philosophy forums.

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This seems like an argument in general. IOW it doesn’t sound like you are making a specific case evaluation or Think one is even relevent. We can rule it out on a category level. Such things do not happen we can assert. Nothing unfair could have regularly happened.

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There was a special sub-forum set up in religion where only the faithful could post. It was to provide a place for christian group hugs or something. I assume it went the way of all the specialty sub-forums for lack of participation. So C-N, your complaint is invalid. The reason you find few christian posts is because there are few christians among the membership. Being a heathen, I don’t care about any of the religions, but addressing issues of spirituality is both worthy and interesting.

FWIW, I haven’t seen you post all that many come-to-jesus threads - anywhere. Animal chakras? A little out of the christian mainstream, isn’t it? :-"

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IOW? FWIW? WTFAYGTA?

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So because there once was a forum only for Christians and this faded away, then what CN is describing about the current religion forum can’t be valid? That doesn’t make any sense. (and note: as far as I have seen Felix ((it is Felix isn’t it?)) is fine, but I find some of the argument presented here rather odd. I’m waiting to see if he decides to give examples Before assuming he must be wrong.)

But he wasn’t complaining there were few Christian posts.

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You’re right. He complained about everything but. He suggested favoratism by Felix, who he called an atheist. There are those of us who will take on ANY religion when a member posts “because God says so”. What can you expect in a religion forum if there is nothing but warm fuzzy agreement? If the forum allows is, then it rightfully must allow isn’ts. The religion forum isn’t just for the devout believers, but for the doubters as well. If C-N wants a boycott, all he has to do is stop reading or posting in the religion forum. That the majority of the membership of ILP are not religious is just the way it is and not because the non-religious are “favored” by the moderator or the administration.

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Moreno has spoken justly, again. I would like to officially say, “ditto”.

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Sure. Are you suggesting that that covers what he is Writing about? IOW it seems implicit that what you are arguing here is that really, there is no unfair untreatment of Christians. What is actually happening is that when they assert that something is true ‘because God says so’, some people challenge them on this.
Is this true? Are there no patterns of reaction to Christians that are negative and do not fit this pattern?

I have seen other kinds of posts, where people react, sometimes not really on topic even, and vent their anti-religious beliefs, sometimes with more direct insults at least aimed generally at believers and other types of negative reactions that do not fall under a category of valid, rational challenges even the specific category you mention (as if that was the only kind of response from non-theists there).

I don’t know that these have been treatly unfairly by Felix. That’s a pattern I haven’t seen. But I did suggest to CN to give example and try to show the pattern.

It seems like he is not complaining about being disagreed with. Maybe you are right, maybe the truth is that, really, he is just upset that some people disagree with him or challenge his ideas in perfectly valid philosophical ways. I don’t know how you know this and it seems speculative to me, but I can imagine someone reacting that way. Given that I see a greater range of negative reaction posts, some significant minority not so nice and rational, I am open to the possibility there is a problematic pattern.

But that is precisely what he is saying he will do and is suggesting that other do it.

It might not be just the way it is. Long term patterns of certain kinds of treatment will affect participation.

It seems to me he is asserting things are one way and I hope he backs this up, and you are asserting things are Another way and I am not sure how you would back some of this up. How we would now why there is low participation by christians. So for me, I want to see more to back up his position and for me, now, it is speculative, but it seems to me your position is mere speculation, at this Point, also. And some of this speculation is about him and his cognitive processes: He says he has a problem with X and Y, but really he wants no one to disagree when Christians say Gods says it so it is true

I don’t see how this kind of speculation on your part really aids skepticism towards religion or fits with it very well.

Last: I don’t Think you understood what he was doing on his Animal Chakras thread.

I’ll leave it at that unless he actually does bring in examples rather than doing what he says he will do here and boycott.

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Moreno,

I’ve participated in the religion forum for almost ten years and I’ve seen both extremes of religious fervor and anti-religious knee-jerk reaction. Most of either one has been weeded out over time. But that isn’t what I’m talking about. C-N is claiming administration or moderator favoritism toward anti-religious people. He calls Felix an atheist as if that is somehow proof of that favoritism. I could be wrong, but the tone of his complaint is one I’ve seen dozens of times before. For whatever reason, theists seem to expect a get-out-of-jail pass on anything they might say related to their religious beliefs and take umbrage at being challenged. Am I speculating? Probably. But it is well seasoned speculation, just as you are speculating that he can show some sort of connection to some noble pursuit as in the animal chakra thread. Even I can create a generalized connection to christianity in that thread, but if it was there, it was well hidden. Is the religion forum dominated by atheists, agnostics, and doubters? Sure seems that way. But that isn’t only in the religion forum, but in every forum on the site. It isn’t any stretch of logic to come to the conclusion that true believers are a distinct minority among ILP membership.

Another clue starts with taking religion out of the complaint. It then reads like the same tired complaining because a thread has been moved, and moderators are picking on (insert name of “victim” here). More speculation on my part? Yup. But how many times do you have to see a pattern before you call it out?