Question of the Day #38: Arrogance
TV's Mr. Neil Permalink
15 comments
Let's face it. Christians just don't like being called ignorant. They don't even like it when its implied. If you so much as insinuate that they somehow misunderstood something published a scientific journal, they get all angry with you and accuse you of being arrogant.
*sigh!* I have to confess that I'm totally thrown by that sort of reaction. Are there ways to get through to Christians without immediately triggering their snotty intellectual defense system?
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15 Comments:
Are there ways to get through to Christians without immediately triggering their snotty intellectual defense system?
Suggestion #1: Stop believing that about 2 billion people will all have the single, identical response to a specific stimulus.
Mike has a point. The ones you probably interact with Mr. Neil, are the ones that attempt to engage you with the scientific half-truths that they have been fed by authority figures in their lives. One of the main problems with this scenario is that you are asking them to distrust their sources, and this is usually someone they trust blindly.
"Suggestion #1: Stop believing that about 2 billion people will all have the single, identical response to a specific stimulus."
Sorry, but nobody believes that. Stop believing that people are that stupid.
Trying to interact with Christians intellectually is usually worthless. In their minds, faith trumps intellect, so any argument you make from that angle is just going to go nowhere, depending on how much faith they have.
Save the intellectual stuff for after they've shaken off the fog of belief- you'll be a lot more effective targeting the inadeqacies and immorality of faith.
"Let's face it. Christians just don't like being called ignorant."
Does anybody?
The fact is, what you've described here as "Christian" behavior may indeed be true for many Christians, but I've noted the same sorts of behavior among atheists, Jews, Muslims and so forth.
Everyone has their hot buttons, and when it comes to the divide between Christians and atheists, many people on both sides of the fence get heated when you try to discuss evolution in particular. I remember once being in the midst of a flame war where one atheist refused to accept that a supernatural cause of life as we know it was at all possible, while the way a particular Christian was responding, you'd think in his mind "evolution" was defined as "Satanism".
Personally, I enjoy discussing just about anything, so long as the discussion is civil and everyone agrees that we're allowed to leave the discussion believing what we want to believe. After all, no matter how much I argue and insist that there is a God, and no matter someone else may argue and insist there is no God, there are people whose minds will not be changed in the end.
"Sorry, but nobody believes that. Stop believing that people are that stupid"
Quite true, but Mike still has a point, no matter how badly he expresses it. The phrase "snotty intellectual defense system" is inflammatory, and connotes both prejudice and condescension when linked to a broad generalization. Unless of course the Christians you refer to actually empty their sinuses at you.
Zack is essentially correct in that many Christians I know cannot be backed into a corner intellecually. They have a doorway into the Land of Magic called "faith" through which they can escape.
Sorry, but nobody believes that. Stop believing that people are that stupid.
Uh, what? Where does Neil qualify his statement? He implies exactly that. All Christians react in a particular way when he approaches him in that particular way.
Mike and brucker are snotty little rags.
Frankie, you say the sweetest things!
Go fuck yourself.
Aaaah! Not profanity! I must engage my "snotty intellectual defense system"!
Wait for it...
"I accuse you of being arrogant."
Whew, I feel much better now.
I don't deny my arrogance or jackassery. The difference between you and me is that I actually have something intelligent to say.
The difference between you and me is that I actually have something intelligent to say.
Haha. You talk as if that's a settled issue. You're your own best audience.
That's an inane thing to say. Isn't anyone his own best audience ?
Speak for yourself. I can't wait for me to shut up.
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