You’ll have to talk to Obama first-apparently he’s the one allowed to determine what parts of Israel belong to the Jews.

Yeah I don’t know what Obama was thinking. I voted for the guy…but he hasn’t made all the right choices. He also has no right to dictate the borders of Israel. Israel at Palestine have to come to some sort of compromise, which unfortunately will never happen. The Palestinians have much more land and should just be happy with that. Isn’t their true holy land in Egypt anyhow? LOL

Maybe she is in a different time zone…or in Israel. In Israel only one day of Shavuot is observed (so it ends on Wednesday night). Also the holiday is over at sundown…so that time is different depending on where you are located).

Very true, Rishona. Thanks!

Iris writes: “You are allowed for example to leave the electricity on befor the holiday kick in, but not shut it on and off during the holiday. Same apply if you want for example to leave your oven on on low, so you can warm food during the hoilday, but you must lev it on for the duration. You are not allowed to use the electricity by doing the act of on and off- like a verb. one is allowed to walk at night and there are street lights, but he or she did not turn them on or off.”

Iris, let me be clear by saying this is not directed at you personally, but rather at the belief system itself.

Can you people not see how completely asinine this is??? Am I REALLY to believe that G-d wants you to leave the oven, air conditioner, lights, etc on all day long which has a NEGATIVE effect on the planet that he created, just so you don’t have to touch a switch on a random day??? Really??? Are people really that naive and gullible??? Really???

You people actually believe that G-d wants you to waste the resources you are given and damage the environment instead of flicking a switch??? LOL

And people who are religious wonder why others consider them to be in cults. The reason is because cults think FOR the person and the people blindly follow without thinking for themselves. They lure you into one item such as this and once they get people to do it, then it becomes easier for the cult to get the follower to do something else as precedent has now been set. In this particular case, the cult isn’t even really inconveniencing the lemmings because the followers still get full electricity, use of an oven, etc as long as they take advantage of the GIANT loophole that has been “conveniently” provided for them by the cult.

Simply mind-boggling.

Peace!

Kyle- You seem to have a LOT of opinions when it comes to the Jewish religion. I’m just curious how much you’ve studied it to have so many opinions.

I assume you wouldn’t attempt surgery without proper medical training. I assume you wouldn’t offer legal advice to someone without legal training. Please understand Jewish law is NO less complex that these aforementioned subjects and until you’ve become an expert in it, you have no right to criticize it.

Thanks!

Kyle, you are showing your ignorance. Judaism is a way of life and, if you knew anything about Judaism, you would know that there is a huge body of law — this is the body of law that many of the moral legal systems of the world (including the US) have based their legal systems on. Belief is very secondary to deeds. Judaism is about being a good person, treating others with respect. You might also understand that fear is not an element — Lo Ira ra (I will not fear evil), King David said in Psalms, Ki Ata Imadi (because you [G-d] are with me). G-d is not Zeus waiting to find fault and punish; G-d is our rock, G-d is our strength.

IMHO, anti-Religious people are living in a world of fear and delusion (mostly the latter, since the “big bang”, which, BTW, I do believe in, only explains so much). Since Judaism has so few adherents in this world (we make up only about .2% of the world population, and that includes secular Jews), people have a tendency to lump us together with religions of fear (and there are many, IMHO).

Whatever one believes in the comfort of one’s own soul, one should respect others’ beliefs. You, apparently, do not.

Debbie says, “Kyle, you are showing your ignorance.”

You are suppor7ing fairy 7ales and calling o7her people ignoran7.

——

“Judaism is a way of life”

As i7 is for 7he Amish as well. A lady jus7 died recen7ly because she suffered severe burns from doing her laundry over a fire and 7hen reusing 7o be 7aken a medical hospi7al which would have saved her life because of her fairy 7ale religion. Bu7 i7 is also a way of life for her, so I guess in your world, 7ha7 makes i7 OK. Awesome.

——

“and, if you knew anything about Judaism, you would know that there is a huge body of law — this is the body of law that many of the moral legal systems of the world (including the US) have based their legal systems on.”

You mean 7he legal sys7em where we have more people in jail bo7h per capi7a and in aggrega7e of any coun7ry in 7he plane7? Lol Our laws are based on 7he Magna Car7a.

——

“Belief is very secondary to deeds.”

So you are saying 7ha7 i7 is more impor7an7 7o do good works 7han 7o believe in God? Are you kidding? If 7ha7 is 7he case, 7hen 7here is no need 7o have 7he God par7 a7 all.

——

“Judaism is about being a good person, treating others with respect. “

Vir7ually every single socie7y on 7he plane7 has a “Golden Rule.” I7 is a human condi7ion 7ha7 exis7s independen7 of some ancien7 fairy 7ale religion.

——

“You might also understand that fear is not an element — Lo Ira ra (I will not fear evil), King David said in Psalms, Ki Ata Imadi (because you [G-d] are with me). G-d is not Zeus waiting to find fault and punish; G-d is our rock, G-d is our strength.”

Please don’7 quo7e me ancien7 books wri77en by men who know less abou7 7he world in which we live 7han a 57h grader does 7oday. You’d never le7 a 57h grader rule your life, bu7 when i7 comes 7o religion, 7hen i7 is “magically” OK for you 7o do so. Amazing.

Bu7 since we wan7 7o quo7e ancien7 books, le7’s do i7: “Whoever obeys 7he gods, 7o him 7hey par7icularly lis7en.” 7ha7 was from 7he Iliad. Maybe I should le7 7ha7 book rule my life.

——

“IMHO, anti-Religious people are living in a world of fear and delusion (mostly the latter, since the “big bang”, which, BTW, I do believe in, only explains so much). “

If you believe in i7 in par7, 7hen how can you say i7 is delusional as compared 7o humans making up some Fairy Godfa7her in 7he sky?

I don’7 know if you’ve ever read i7 or no7, bu7 here’s an ac7ual le77er sen7 7o 7he Kansas School board. 7he au7hor was a77emp7ing 7o be face7ious, bu7 i7 goes 7o show 7he ridiculous na7ure of 7hese religious beliefs:

http://www.venganza.org/about/open-letter/

No one knows all of 7he answers. Science doesn’7 know and religion doesn’7 know, bu7 a7 leas7 science has some of i7 correc7.

——

“Since Judaism has so few adherents in this world (we make up only about .2% of the world population, and that includes secular Jews), people have a tendency to lump us together with religions of fear (and there are many, IMHO).”

People lump you in 7oge7her because everyone suffers wi7h 7he Jews, Muslims and Chris7ians all figh7ing over “religious ground” because of 7heir ancien7 books. Moreover, all 7hree of 7hem begin wi7h religious brainwashing from an early age.

——

“Whatever one believes in the comfort of one’s own soul, one should respect others’ beliefs. You, apparently, do not.”

In 7his coun7ry, you and Carolyn have EVERY righ7 7o hold wha7ever beliefs you wan7 7o. I suppor7 7ha7 because I love my coun7ry firs7 and foremos7. Wi7h 7ha7 said, 7he only people 7ha7 you are hur7ing are yourselves by holding delusional beliefs 7ha7 are based on uneduca7ed men several millennia ago. I suppor7 7ha7 Amish woman’s righ7s as well and look where 7ha7 go7 her.

And in case you are wondering why all 7he 7’s in my pos7… well 7oday is some crazy made up holiday in my “religion” and 7oday, I can’7 use 7he le77er… ummm… 7he le77er be7ween “S” and “U” and so 7o make i7 OK, I am replacing i7 wi7h some7hing 7ha7 looks similar which is a “7.” Because I am using a loophole in my “religion’s” law, I was s7ill able 7o provide a link 7o Venganza and in 7ha7 link, i7 is OK for me 7o use 7ha7 aforemen7ioned le77er in i7 because I copied 7he link yes7erday, no7 7oday. 7his way I wan7 7o make sure 7o keep “7rue” 7o my religion and show 7he world wha7 a luna7ic, I mean s7rong believer of my fai7h, I am.

Harold says: “Your closemindedness about any beliefs that don’t fit with your own”

LOL… I used to be very religious. It was because i was OPEN minded that I am no longer a part of organized religion. So I’ve tried both sides of the equation. How much time have you spent NOT being a believer?

———–

“your extreme judgmentalism of everyone who doesn’t agree with you”

Yes, that’s probably why my innermost circle of friends (many of whom I’ve known since grade school) includes Jews, Christians, Atheists, Agnostics, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, etc among them.

I don’t need people to agree with me, just that they should exercise critical thinking skills and think for THEMSELVES.

———-

“your name calling, and your looking down on people who see the world differently than you do”

The VERY first words I posted here were: “Aviva, I’m sure you are a nice lady.”

People like yourself and Debbie are the ones name calling and looking down on people who see the world differently than yourselves.

—————

“all of this shows how necessary Judaism and religion in general still are.”

If there were no religion, there wouldn’t be any looking down on religion whatsoever because it wouldn’t exist. That’s a great argument you’ve got there! LOL

——————

“If all we were left with was the hateful snobbery you’ve displayed in your comments (presumably based on what you see as a superior and “open minded” secularism), then our world would be in big trouble.”

Oh yes, we would indeed Harold. Let’s see what that world would look like without religion:

1) Who has the highest IQ’s? Oh yeah, those would be atheists. Studies have been done in terms of religious beliefs and IQ. Atheists had the highest IQ’s, followed by agnostics, followed by people who have medium religious beliefs, followed by the devout hardcore believers coming in dead last. Thus, the more you believe, the lower your IQ. Therefore, God created his believers as the least intelligent segment of society. Classic!

And do you know which demographic of society believes in God the most? Yep, that’s right… grade school children… you know… the same ones that believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Boogeyman and the Tooth Fairy. What a shocker.

2) Who are the world’s biggest philanthropists? Those would be Bill Gates and Warren Buffett… two atheists. Too bad they don’t have religion to squander their money on instead.

3) The so called Bible Belt also boasts the highest rate of teen pregnancy BY FAR in the country while the ultra liberal NorthEast has the lowest. Do you know why this is? It is because religious nuts enforce teaching “abstinence” instead of “birth control.” And despite it not CLEARLY not working, they keep doing it anyway because they are delusional.

4) Atheists/Agnostics have lower rates of divorce than Jews, Christians and even the Mormons. Those religions are sure strengthening the bonds of “holy” matrimony indeed. But hey, what do facts matter in a world of delusion?

5) Places like Israel would become more peaceful instead of a being on constant military alert. Boy that Jerusalem sure is a paradise. All peaceful in that region of the world. Nothing bad happening there.

Etc, etc, etc.

So without religion, the world would be more intelligent, less delusional, still donate to charities, have lower rates of teen pregnancy, have lower rates of divorce and we’d have fewer wars. Why would anyone in the human race want any of those things? [roll eyes]

This is how delusional religion is: If all of the world’s nuclear powers took one nuke each and dropped it on Jerusalem to literally wipe it off the face of the Earth, do you know what would happen? The Jews, Muslims and Christians would don hazmat suits and start fighting over the completely worthless toxic rubble. Why? Because they are delusional fanatics. It is sheer insanity.

To quote a great poet who got it right:

“Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace.”

Peace Harold!

Kyle,

I’m sure you still see yourself as very open, but thank you for proving all of my points.

Ah, the usual arguments that atheists are all just so smart while people who are religious are that way because they’re just not very bright – yawn . . . if I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard this.

As you know, there are lies, damn lies and statistics. I’ve known plenty of atheists who are dumber than doorknobs and plenty of religious people who could run intellectual circles around you without breaking a sweat (in fact, the girl who is the subject of the article that you have such a problem with – she was the class Valedictorian – apparently not an intellectual slouch – do you really think she knows nothing of evolution, etc.?).

Maybe the stereotypes work for you, but weren’t you the one who keeps saying we need to face reality, not just what we’d like to believe? You’d love to put all religious people in one negative box and all atheists in one positive one – that kind of thinking is pretty black and white fundamentalist, don’t you think?

And please, no I don’t need you to “simplify” anything for me. I’m all grown up and capable of thinking on my own. And if there’s something I don’t understand, then maybe I can bring it to the guy down the block from me with a Ph.D. in Physics, or the next door neighbor who is a full Professor in linguistics, or the corporate lawyer who lives across from me – oh, but they’re all Orthodox Jews, so maybe I should assume their intellectual accomplishments couldn’t be real since they’re religious.

Your generalities help no one – Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are atheists? (Bill did grow up Congregationalist – you discount the possibility that his upbringing could have influenced his values, regardless of his formal beliefs now). Stalin and Hitler were atheists, too. And Mother Theresa was religious, if I’m not mistaken. So? If I play the same selective game that you do, I can come to any conclusion I want. Who are the biggest philanthropists? If you look on the group level rather than at two individuals, you’ll get a result that you won’t like. And in any event, the idea of giving away part of your income as an obligation to society comes from the Bible – it’s great that you like to claim all these wonderful atheist values, but you’re living in borrowed clothes.

As far as Jerusalem, since I live here, I think I can speak with a bit more authority than you about what it’s really like. It’s nothing like what the news portrays. On a daily basis, I see acts of kindness done here in the name of religion that would amaze most people. You can choose not to believe me, but as I said, I live here, so I think I’m entitled to say I know more about what my own two eyes tell me than you.

In answer to your questions (not that I owe you an answer): Although I was born Jewish, I grew up agnostic, and did not become religious until well into adulthood (and yes, I went to college and law school, and took philosophy courses and everything; I even learned to read and write and I still became religious – but no, I don’t believe that the earth is flat, or in the tooth fairy or Santa Claus for that matter). Before I became an observant Jew, I did spend some serious time exploring both Christianity and several eastern religions. So no, you don’t have a “sneaky suspicion” and “already know the answers” about anything in my background. You just have a lot of base stereotypes that you need to hold onto because you wouldn’t want anything to interfere with your “openminded” world view.

Let’s be brutally honest here – to say that most people convert to Judaism for marriage is incredibly disrespectful to converts and to Judaism. Yes, of course there are people who convert for marriage (although far less than there used to be since intermarriage is pretty much accepted in most circles) – but please don’t be so insulting. As if someone might not convert to Judaism because they actually like the religion and it makes sense to them (as hard as that may be for your mind to comprehend). As if someone who marries a Jew can’t think on their own two feet. As if an Orthodox convert who goes through a 2-3 year study process hasn’t taken the time to think about what they’re doing (and many of them aren’t even married to a Jew). I daresay I’ve known far more converts than you – and although some do convert for marriage, the majority these days don’t. Sorry if you think Judaism has nothing to offer people on its own terms – some of us feel differently.

As to your comment that I have no idea how much or little you know about Judaism – it’s true that I can’t actually know since I haven’t met you. I was basing my opinion on the comments you’ve made here. Those comments display a lot of hostility, anger stereotypes, and overall belittling of Judaism (and other religions) – but no, I haven’t seen anything in the comments you chose to write that would suggest you have more than a very superficial knowledge of my religion.

And with that, I will end my part of this discussion. I’m sure you have more to say, no doubt based on more stereotypes. But while you’re busy opining about how ignorant we all are, I think my time will be better spent speaking with the religious Ph.D. down the street.

Thank you for your posts Harold; I completely agree! I am a convert to Orthodox Judaism and I am single, college-educated (currently in graduate school, working on my M.B.A.) and very far from being brainwashed!

I was also the national president of a multicultural sorority. I had years of involvement in the skinhead community. I can sense stereotypes and close-mindedness a mile away. Kyle is the token case of intolerance. It’s really quite sad!

Harold says: “I’m sure you still see yourself as very open, but thank you for proving all of my points.”

Thanks for proving all your points… classic!

—–

“Ah, the usual arguments that atheists are all just so smart while people who are religious are that way because they’re just not very bright – yawn . . . if I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard this.”

Ummm… I have evidence to back it up with. Once again, this is you not accepting reality. I am merely reporting the facts. There are plenty of brilliant Christians, Jews, Muslims, etc just like there are plenty of ignorant atheists and agnostics…. however, when all is said and done, the averages show (both on an individual level AND on a country level) that the more someone believes, the lower their IQ. Sorry if the truth is painful.

——–

“As you know, there are lies, damn lies and statistics. I’ve known plenty of atheists who are dumber than doorknobs and plenty of religious people who could run intellectual circles around you without breaking a sweat (in fact, the girl who is the subject of the article that you have such a problem with – she was the class Valedictorian – apparently not an intellectual slouch – do you really think she knows nothing of evolution, etc.?).”

The mere fact that I need to explain the law of averages to you speaks volumes.

Did you not learn about the concept of averages back in grade school? Here’s how it works… there are some exceptions to the rule. Right now, there is literally snow in Hawaii. That doesn’t mean that it is always cold in Hawaii. In fact, it would still AVERAGE out to be HOT because it is hot far more days than it is cold. It is BASIC common sense.

——-

‘Maybe the stereotypes work for you, but weren’t you the one who keeps saying we need to face reality, not just what we’d like to believe? You’d love to put all religious people in one negative box and all atheists in one positive one – that kind of thinking is pretty black and white fundamentalist, don’t you think?”

Once again, I can support my claims with evidence. Moreover, who even said that I consider myself an atheist? Finally, I don’t put them all in one box as I just stated above that there are exceptions to the rule.

——-

“And please, no I don’t need you to “simplify” anything for me. I’m all grown up and capable of thinking on my own.”

Obviously.

——

And if there’s something I don’t understand, then maybe I can bring it to the guy down the block from me with a Ph.D. in Physics, or the next door neighbor who is a full Professor in linguistics, or the corporate lawyer who lives across from me – oh, but they’re all Orthodox Jews, so maybe I should assume their intellectual accomplishments couldn’t be real since they’re religious.

Hey… you live amongst people who share your same belief system… what a surprise. In any event, you could ask any of them or you can ask me.

——–

Your generalities help no one – Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are atheists? (Bill did grow up Congregationalist – you discount the possibility that his upbringing could have influenced his values, regardless of his formal beliefs now). ”

Of course it could have… so could his atheists beliefs as well. The point being that God made the two of the richest men in the history of the planet non-believers and they give massive amounts of money to charity.

——-

“Stalin and Hitler were atheists, too. And Mother Theresa was religious, if I’m not mistaken.”

You are mistaken. HItler used RELIGION against your own Jews during the war. The symbol on their flag was an ancient cross for Pete’s sake. Stalin was an atheist. Mother Teresa was unbelievably corrupt and questioned her faith as she was dying.

——-

“So? If I play the same selective game that you do, I can come to any conclusion I want. Who are the biggest philanthropists? If you look on the group level rather than at two individuals, you’ll get a result that you won’t like.”

Just curious… how many poor and/or homeless people do you have living in your house? Do you not have room for your fellow man in your home?

There are around 3 million homeless people living in America. That means there are over 80 Christians to help every single homeless person in America. 80 to 1 !!! How can there still be that many homeless with all of these self-proclaimed good Christians around? There are around 44 million “second homes” in the United States. When you do the math and factor in that around 75-80% of the population of the US is Christian, then it is pretty clear that there are at least 3 million Christians that own second homes. Thus, how can there be so many homeless people living here? Surely, Jesus wouldn’t have hoarded two houses just for himself and leave his fellow man out on the street now would he? Of course not, but it just goes to show the hypocrisy that goes on within organized religion.

——-

“And in any event, the idea of giving away part of your income as an obligation to society comes from the Bible – it’s great that you like to claim all these wonderful atheist values, but you’re living in borrowed clothes.”

Amazing how you continue to assume I an atheist… just goes to show how you jump to conclusions.

Moreover, the first taxes came about in ancient Egypt and evidence of these comes from sources other than the Bible that are older.

——-

“As far as Jerusalem, since I live here, I think I can speak with a bit more authority than you about what it’s really like. It’s nothing like what the news portrays. On a daily basis, I see acts of kindness done here in the name of religion that would amaze most people. You can choose not to believe me, but as I said, I live here, so I think I’m entitled to say I know more about what my own two eyes tell me than you.”

So you are living in paradise huh? How many Muslims live in your peaceful neighborhood by percentage? I know the families of those killed in the World Trade Center love the peace that goes on there. I know the American soldiers getting killed in that region love the peace there. How many decades have you been fighting over your borders?

Do you need me to list off incident after incident after incident where Israeli citizens were killed by terrorists? The fact that it has become the norm there is disturbing because in many other countries, it isn’t commonplace. But if you like it there, then I’m happy for you.

——-

“In answer to your questions (not that I owe you an answer):”

I give you credit for the courage to answer “some” of them. Kudos!

——–

“Although I was born Jewish, I grew up agnostic, and did not become religious until well into adulthood (and yes, I went to college and law school, and took philosophy courses and everything; I even learned to read and write and I still became religious”

Fair enough… so if you were born into an Iranian family in Tehran or a Buddhist family in Tibet or an atheist family in Alaska, do you REALLY think that you’d be a convert to Judaism and living in Israel? I think we both know you wouldn’t.

If I were born in Ethiopia, I’d probably be an uneducated, very devout Christian. I can freely admit it because it is simply reality. I was fortunate to have been born in a geographical location that allowed me the gift of education and free thought.

———–

“– but no, I don’t believe that the earth is flat, or in the tooth fairy or Santa Claus for that matter).”

And I didn’t think that you did.

—————

“Before I became an observant Jew, I did spend some serious time exploring both Christianity and several eastern religions. So no, you don’t have a “sneaky suspicion” and “already know the answers” about anything in my background.”

No, actually I DID have a sneaky suspicion. Notice that I didn’t say that I had a known fact. Thus it was a suspicion. For someone that has apparently gone to law school, that’s quite an oversight. Moreover, I don’t already know the answers to your background and thus I was ASKING. That basic concept shouldn’t be too difficult to understand. Now that you’ve told me, the “suspicion” is gone and “fact” (according to you which I will believe) has taken precedence. Not rocket science.

———-

“Let’s be brutally honest here – to say that most people convert to Judaism for marriage is incredibly disrespectful to converts and to Judaism. Yes, of course there are people who convert for marriage (although far less than there used to be since intermarriage is pretty much accepted in most circles) – but please don’t be so insulting.”

I am not being insulting… it is REALITY. If you find reality insulting, then I apologize. Are or are not most converts to Judaism via marriage? Yes or no? Simple question.

——–

“As if someone might not convert to Judaism because they actually like the religion and it makes sense to them (as hard as that may be for your mind to comprehend). As if someone who marries a Jew can’t think on their own two feet.”

You are making logical leaps that have nothing to do with the issue at hand. Of course people that marry a Jew can think for themselves. Of course people can convert to Judaism without marriage.

——–

As if an Orthodox convert who goes through a 2-3 year study process hasn’t taken the time to think about what they’re doing (and many of them aren’t even married to a Jew). I daresay I’ve known far more converts than you – and although some do convert for marriage, the majority these days don’t.

So you are saying that the majority of Jews that convert today do not do so via marriage??? Really? Of course you can provide credible evidence to prove this right? I’d love to see it.

——————

“Sorry if you think Judaism has nothing to offer people on its own terms – some of us feel differently.”

Of course it does… if offers people who “NEED” something in their lives because they can’t do it without an ancient book providing it for them. Religion serves as a form of therapy, as a form of camaraderie, as a form of sense of belonging to a group, etc, etc, etc. Some people need those things and others don’t.

——–

“As to your comment that I have no idea how much or little you know about Judaism – it’s true that I can’t actually know since I haven’t met you.”

Thank you for being realistic. That is all I ask of anyone.

———-

“I was basing my opinion on the comments you’ve made here.”

I haven’t made enough comments to really ascertain one way nor the other. In contrast, you being a Jew and living in Israel obviously have a firm grip on it.

——–

“And with that, I will end my part of this discussion. I’m sure you have more to say, no doubt based on more stereotypes.”

The mere fact that you stereotype me as an atheist and then accuse me of stereotypes is rather comical.

Speaking of stereotypes, I notice how you skipped out on some of my questions, such as say, how do you feel about gay marriage? After all, we are the hateful ones apparently. I treat all of my fellow human beings with the same rights I would want for myself. Do you?

————-

“But while you’re busy opining about how ignorant we all are”

The fact that you don’t understand the concept of averages and then say “ALL are” pretty much imprints the emphasis of my point.

———-

“I think my time will be better spent speaking with the religious Ph.D. down the street.”

If you knew how many theologians I’ve spoken with over the years, you’d realize that it wouldn’t be a problem. Meanwhile, I can look down my street and see the Indian Hindu with his PhD, my next door neighbors who are Chinese Born Agains who have a PhD in Psychology and her husband pulls in a high 6 figures in computer engineering, the Bulgarian agnostic C-Level Executive and his family, the Filipino Catholic MD, the Persian Orthodox Jew Business Owner, the Samoan Baha’i teacher, etc, etc, etc.

I wonder which of the two of us is more diverse.

Peace Dan!

Rishona says: “I am a convert to Orthodox Judaism and I am single, college-educated (currently in graduate school, working on my M.B.A.) and very far from being brainwashed!”

So because you are college educated means that aren’t brainwashed?

So why did you convert and what did you convert “from?”

——-

“I was also the national president of a multicultural sorority.”

I on the other hand didn’t join a fraternity because I didn’t feel some internal need to buy my way into a group of friends when I was perfectly capable and self-confident of making them on my own. Instead, I used the money I saved to help the needy in my collegiate community.

——-

“I had years of involvement in the skinhead community.”

As a skinhead or as a volunteer?

—-

“I can sense stereotypes and close-mindedness a mile away. Kyle is the token case of intolerance. It’s really quite sad!”

Apparently you can’t sense it or you’d realize that I don’t have a diverse inner circle of friends by being some intolerant, closed-minded, stereotypical spewing dolt. In fact, most of my time on message boards is spent sticking up for illegal immigrants here from Mexican haters, sticking up for gays from the intolerant bigots that use religion to look down upon them, sticking up for Muslims who get attacked by Christians and Jews, the homeless who have no voice, for women that still don’t have true equal rights, for the handicapped etc, etc, etc.

But thanks for “stereotyping” me. Ah, the irony! Classic!

Peace!

Kyle,

Let me try to be clear (since you haven’t seemed to get much of what I’ve said yet): I’m not trying to use the “escape card” to close the conversation. This may surprise you, but your arguments are not particularly original, interesting or persuasive. I’ve heard them all before, albeit usually not delivered with such a strident tone. The reason I’m not interested in continuing the conversation is that it’s futile and a big waste of my time. I have no interest in continuing a back-and-forth where you insist you’ve answered all my questions (you haven’t), make lots of negative assumptions about me or my views (you have), miss much of what I’m saying and in the process assume I must be too stupid to understand what you’re saying (thanks so much, but I already understood the law of averages even before your “helpful” explanation), insist you have “proof” of your views (in my experience, anyone who says they “know,” doesn’t – in the meantime, you may wish to learn more about correlation vs. causality and other context-based statistical concepts, as well as different concepts of IQ, and of course the other studies that conflict with your views), and through all the name-calling insists they are open-minded (your comments betray an intellectual rigidity that’s quite entrenched). You also may want to brush up on your history before “explaining” Hitler to me (the swastika is over 3,000 years old – it predates the cross – I could go on, but it would be a futile exercise).

Your views on converts still are offensive whether you recognize it or not. You originally said most converts came to Judaism for marriage – when I challenged that, you said “via” marriage. Let me see if I can simplify this for you – A good friend of mine takes me to a restaurant that I love. I now only want to eat there. If not for my friend, I never would have known about the restaurant. I like the restaurant as a result of my friend bringing me there – but I don’t like the restaurant “because” of my friend, I don’t eat there to make my friend happy. The majority of Jewish converts who come to Judaism in the course of their marriage (and there are many who come to it independently), convert because they like Judaism, not because of their spouse.

I don’t feel any need to defend myself about my or my community’s commitment to helping people or regarding Palestinians. I daily share the road with Palestinians, shop in the same stores as Palestinians, the doctors in my community treat children from local Palestinian villages for free, our community raised funds to build a medical clinic in a neighboring Palestinian village (the funds were rejected by the PA), etc. And that’s in addition to all of the helping the homeless and the destitute find treatment, jobs, medical care, shelter, etc. So please, you can spare me your self-righteous questioning.

Would I be Jewish if I was born a Catholic in Ireland? You seem to “know” the answer, but I’m a bit more reflective about it – it’s truly hard to say. Maybe I’d be a Catholic, or maybe I would have found Judaism anyway. That’s exactly what happened to someone I know who was born a Catholic in Ireland.

Anyway, I do hope you are someday able to remove that huge chip from your shoulder and get a life.

kylee[however, when all is said and done, the averages show (both on an individual level AND on a country level) that the more someone believes, the lower their IQ. Sorry if the truth is painful]

What will be painfull for you will be when you rot in hell. God once cleared the hole Earth of people and we are all descendents of Noah. Back then, you would have been one of the people that perished by refusing to listen and not getting in the Ark. Start reading your Bible maybe you will learn something.

Harold: “your arguments are not particularly original, interesting or persuasive.”

FYI… It should be “nor” instead of “or” since you used a negative earlier. And of course my arguments aren’t persuasive to you since you are closed-minded. Basic logic.

——–

“The reason I’m not interested in continuing the conversation is that it’s futile and a big waste of my time.”

The mere fact that you think having conversations with people who maintain different views is futile just further illustrates your close-mindedness.

——

“I have no interest in continuing a back-and-forth where you insist you’ve answered all my questions (you haven’t)”

LOL… what haven’t I answered? Was there some minor question or questions that slipped through the cracks? Why don’t you just admit that I’ve answered all or virtually all of your questions while you have not reciprocated to the same degree? It’s right there in black and white, plain as day for ALL to see.

——

“miss much of what I’m saying and in the process assume I must be too stupid to understand what you’re saying (thanks so much, but I already understood the law of averages even before your “helpful” explanation)”

So you understood the law of averages, but were just too incompetent to know how to apply it? If you understood the concept and understood how to apply it, then you never would have made that argument to begin with. So which is it? lol

——-

“insist you have “proof” of your views (in my experience, anyone who says they “know,” doesn’t”

LOL… unlike other people, I research what I say before I say it. That way, when people like you try to make statements like that, I can throw it right back in their face.

——-

“in the meantime, you may wish to learn more about correlation vs. causality and other context-based statistical concepts”

LOL… one of my higher education degrees dealt directly with that and I’ll bet I’ve taken far more university level statistics and logic units than you have.

——

“and through all the name-calling insists they are open-minded (your comments betray an intellectual rigidity that’s quite entrenched).”

I treat others with the same tone with which they treat me. So it is really a reflection of yourself in a roundabout way.

——–

“You also may want to brush up on your history before “explaining” Hitler to me (the swastika is over 3,000 years old – it predates the cross – I could go on, but it would be a futile exercise).”

LOL… what part of my saying it was an “ancient cross” were you incapable of comprehending? So you may want to brush up on your reading comprehension skills before speaking.

——

“Your views on converts still are offensive whether you recognize it or not. You originally said most converts came to Judaism for marriage – when I challenged that, you said “via” marriage. Let me see if I can simplify this for you – A good friend of mine takes me to a restaurant that I love. I now only want to eat there. If not for my friend, I never would have known about the restaurant. I like the restaurant as a result of my friend bringing me there – but I don’t like the restaurant “because” of my friend, I don’t eat there to make my friend happy. The majority of Jewish converts who come to Judaism in the course of their marriage (and there are many who come to it independently), convert because they like Judaism, not because of their spouse.”

First off, I’ve apologized if I was offensive and I’ll apologize again as that was not my intent.

With regard to choosing Judaism and not because of their spouse: And you can prove that how?

I see what you are saying, but it seems like you are splitting hairs. While that may happen 100% with SOME people, the majority are influenced by their spouse to one degree or another more than likely. If those same spouses were marrying say a Hindu, they’d likely be converting to Hinduism. It has more to do with the spouse than the religion… otherwise they would have already converted. While you will counter with an analogy that they hadn’t “been to the restaurant yet before meeting their spouse,” I’ll say that they knew the restaurant existed and yet never cared.

Earlier you stated: “although some do convert for marriage, the majority these days don’t.” Then I replied: “So you are saying that the majority of Jews that convert today do not do so via marriage??? Really? Of course you can provide credible evidence to prove this right? I’d love to see it.”

And of course, you don’t present it because you speak without knowing facts and then present your thoughts as if they were indeed fact. Classic.

———

“I don’t feel any need to defend myself about my or my community’s commitment to helping people or regarding Palestinians. I daily share the road with Palestinians, shop in the same stores as Palestinians, the doctors in my community treat children from local Palestinian villages for free, our community raised funds to build a medical clinic in a neighboring Palestinian village (the funds were rejected by the PA), etc. And that’s in addition to all of the helping the homeless and the destitute find treatment, jobs, medical care, shelter, etc.”

On a macro level: How many Palestinians has Israel killed since being recognized as a country? It is amazing how light skinned people think they “belong” and are entitled to a land filled with darker skinned people all over an ancient book. Now the rest of the world has to suffer as a result. If Truman didn’t need the Jewish vote and didn’t recognize Israel (his advisors didn’t want him to do it), the world would be a much more peaceful place today. The US has coddled them ever since.

But I do say kudos to those of you on more of a micro level that are helping the less fortunate Palestinians.

——

“So please, you can spare me your self-righteous questioning.”

So you have no poor and destitute people sharing your comfortable home. Surely God would want his poor children stuck out in dumpsters while others lived in comfort.

——

“Would I be Jewish if I was born a Catholic in Ireland? You seem to “know” the answer, but I’m a bit more reflective about it – it’s truly hard to say. Maybe I’d be a Catholic, or maybe I would have found Judaism anyway. That’s exactly what happened to someone I know who was born a Catholic in Ireland.”

It’s hard to say huh? That’s like me saying, “I bought a lotto ticket today… I might win the $50 Million jackpot… it’s truly hard to say.” Come on. You are in such “denial” that you might as well move to Egypt.

Fine… let’s say that you are living in the Yanomamo tribe in South America who were recently discovered several decades ago. They don’t have modern things. To think you would have ended up in Israel as a member of Judaism is laughable.

What’s even funnier is say that you were born with a twin brother. Your mother gave you both up for adoption. One Jewish family adopted your twin in Jerusalem and one Muslim family adopted you in Tehran. You didn’t know each other existed and met years later. You would be insisting that he had the wrong religion and that Islam was the one true religion. It is so absurd that it is mind-boggling that people can’t see this on their own.

—–

“Anyway, I do hope you are someday able to remove that huge chip from your shoulder and get a life.”

Spoken like a true person of religious faith indeed. Way to take the high road! Can you say H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-S-Y?

And of course, yet AGAIN, you choose to “conveniently” neglect the topic of gay marriage. Classic!

You are the epitome of “tolerance” indeed.

Good luck to you…

Peace!

Sarah writes: “What will be painfull for you will be when you rot in hell. God once cleared the hole Earth of people and we are all descendents of Noah. Back then, you would have been one of the people that perished by refusing to listen and not getting in the Ark. Start reading your Bible maybe you will learn something.”

LOL… virtually ALL cultures have mammoth flood stories and Noah’s story was “borrowed” from other flood stories that preceded the Bible… just like Jesus wandering in the desert in the NT was lifted from Moses wandering the desert in the OT and just like Moses was lifted from other stories preceding the Bible.

As for Noah’s ark, it is IMPOSSIBLE for anyone to have lived even if he did build the ark. Educate yourself and think for yourself!

Why don’t you just ask yourself how the Noah story is possibly true? As a CHILD, I realized that this was impossible.

Just ask yourself this: Since the Bible is apparently inerrant, how exactly Noah was able to get 2 of every species (7 of some depending on which passage you read) on a boat? The story is pretty clearly fiction.

#1: There is no geological evidence of a global flood that destroyed the Earth.

#2: The Biblical story of Noah has contradictions in it.

#3: The only people I know that live to be over 500 years old are fictional. Noah, Gandalf, Yoda, etc.

#4: How exactly did Noah gather up marsupials that are native to Australia?

#5: Anyone who has seen the Crocodile Hunter knows that one man grabbing a croc isn’t easy work. And anyone who has ever tried to catch a stray cat or dog knows how hard it is… now imagine doing that with 600 pound tiger. Now imagine a multi-hundred year old man doing it.

#6: How exactly did Noah provide food for all of those different animals when the entire Earth was covered in water? An elephant can eat well in excess of 500 lbs of food per day. Perhaps he just pulled the ark into the floating Costco drive thru window. lol

The list goes on and on.

Stop and think about this. That’s 40,000 pounds of food alone for just two elephants!!! Now let’s throw in 2 blue whales onto the boat. They can weigh around 400,000 pounds each!!! On top of that, they can eat over 8,000 pounds of krill per day!!! That’s 640,000 pounds of food just for the whales!!! The weight of the whales and their food now equals 1,440,000 pounds. In comparison, the main space shuttle orbiter has a maximum landing weight of 230,000 pounds. So Noah’s Ark would have held the weight of more than 6 space shuttles at maximum landing weight just with the 2 blue whales alone. (none of that even begins to talk about the fact that Noah would have needed to bring along more than 2 (or 7) individual krill to feed those whales.)

And don’t say something like, “The whales could just swim along side the ark” because that much excess water (that supposedly flooded the earth) would have changed the salinity levels in the oceans. If you’ve ever owned salt water fish before, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. Funny how they don’t teach that stuff in church huh? That’s because they are too busy brainwashing you instead.

The above is only talking about 2 species (elephants and blue whales). What about Great White Sharks, Orcas, Grizzlies, Lions, Tigers, Hippos, etc, etc, etc… Never to mind the fact that some animals are carnivores only, so Noah would have needed to bring WAY more than 2 (or 7) animals of some kinds aboard.

Oh yeah, when Noah (being well over 500 years old) has his ship run aground on top of Ararat, how exactly does he then get all the marsupials back to Australia, all the grizzlies back to Western North America, all the polar bears back to the North Pole, all the anacondas back to South America, all the emperor penguins back to Antarctica, etc, etc, etc? Does he build another boat?!? LOL

I won’t even begin to talk about how we discover new species every single day. But I guess Noah found all of those too.

Seriously, try to explain the Noah story ON YOUR OWN and you’ll see that it has no reasonable explanation. Why? Because it is a FICTIONAL story. To believe this story is real, I’ll ask for evidence of other 900 year old men (by valid scientific sources), evidence of a flood that covered the earth (King’s Holly was found in Tasmania that is over 43,000 years old so the flood didn’t happen in the last 43,000 years), etc, etc, etc… You can’t provide it because it is a fictional story. It is basic common sense. If I said Bill Gates gathered up two of every species and put them on a boat, you’d laugh because it is impossible, yet because it is in a 2,000 year old book written by uneducated men, it somehow makes it fact. Simply mind-boggling!!!

Additionally:

NO HUMAN could have survived if that much water flooded the Earth:

Here are a handful of the problems:

1) Direct evidence for a global flood is non-existent.

2) There is no flood signature on the Earth itself.

3) To flood the Earth, we’d need 5 times the volume of water that exists in the oceans!

4) If we took ALL the water from the oceans, ALL the water from the ice, ALL the water contained in the atmosphere and ALL the water from the rocks (which has actually happened in the past), it STILL doesn’t flood the Earth.

5) If it rained for 40 days and nights non stop it STILL doesn’t flood the Earth.

6) It is impossible to have that much water come out of the Earth via springs, geysers and “cracks.” If all of that water was contained inside the Earth (as many Christians “claim” is the case when they get desperate because the other options clearly don’t work), then you wouldn’t have been able to walk on the surface because the Earth’s crust would have turned into a literal quicksand soup.

7) Do you know that humans live underwater? No really, we do. Our atmosphere that we breathe has water in it. If it was a miracle that allowed this much water to happen, then Noah and the animals would STILL have been dead because of the massive amount of water vapor in the atmosphere would have drowned them SIMPLY BY BREATHING! That is of course if they were lucky enough to get in a few breaths before the atmospheric pressure crushed their lungs and killed them first before they drowned. If was caused by geysers alone, then you still wouldn’t have been able to breathe due to the huge amounts of sulfuric gases.

8 – Since NONE of that can cause the flood, the only other option is a comet due to it carrying water with it. The problem here is that comet would have needed be 1,000 miles wide or approximately the size of Brazil. This would have forced the temperature of the atmosphere to skyrocket all the way up to 12,000 degrees Fahrenheit or hotter than the surface of the sun. There would have been no life left on Earth.

9) As can be plainly seen, this story is fiction.

So do you get it yet? It is IMPOSSIBLE!!! To realize it is impossible means you understand reality. To not accept this is to live in delusion.

***
And for all of you here (Jews and Christians) that will say, “Well, we believe in our faith, but we know this story is fiction”… then ask yourselves why you are believing in a book written by people who believed this nonsense to be true!!!! It makes you just as naive and gullible as the people who wrote it.

Peace!

Rishona,

Thanks for your kind words, and for a great post.

Kyle, peace to you too. But you really should give this up already – at first your comments were annoying, then kind of amusing. But as I read them again, the tone, everything about them – I’m starting to feel sorry for you.

Rishona says: ‘So because you are college educated means that you aren’t brainwashed? ” Yes. Because the key to effective brainwashing is to limit the exposure and experiences of the people you are trying to control. When someone has a wide range of experiences, it is more difficult to force-feed them any dogma.”

I agree with your gist. However, be careful to recognize that just because someone is college educated does not mean that they aren’t brainwashed… Especially in the case of someone like Carolyn who is choosing to “expand” her horizons by going to a Jewish university in New York.

————

“To be fair, brainwashing goes on in ALL religions and cultures; Judaism is not exempt from this. But plenty of religious people are a FAR CRY from being brainwashed and have accepted and embraced their religions with open eyes & arms.”

Thank you for being realistic about the first part. While I do agree that there are “plenty” of people that have embraced their religion with open eyes, the vast, vast, vast majority do not.

———

“So why did you convert and what did you convert “from?”” I was born Christian in that I was Christianed. But I did not grow up particularly religious since my father was a Rastafarian and my mother hardly ever went to church. I converted for a pretty standard reason. I discovered Judaism, started observing it, felt that it was the right path for me. End of story.”

Rastafarianism is actually quite an interesting religion that I found to be quite fascinating.

So while you weren’t “as brainwashed” (for the lack of a better term) as some people, you would likely have been instilled with concept of hell and guilt that religion imposes. Planted “seeds” such as those are implemented early on can have a lasting effect on someone.

——-

“Oh and by the way, conversion to Orthodox Judaism is actually very difficult (not impossible…but difficult) if you are doing it for marriage. The non-Orthodox Jewish movements are more keen on it; but they focus on Jewish culture….not Jewish observance (so they can do that).”

I understand that.

———-

“I on the other hand didn’t join a fraternity because I didn’t feel some internal need to buy my way into a group of friends when I was perfectly capable and self-confident of making them on my own. Instead, I used the money I saved to help the needy in my collegiate community. ”

I see that you are not very familiar with the collegiate Greek community. Multicultural fraternities and sororities operate differently. So do the NPHC (Black) fraternities and sororities. The social aspect is just one part of it. There are requirements to get in where we look for and develop leadership qualities. 100 hours of community service are required. Dues (the “money” that you speak of that could be donated to charity) is a whopping $25/semester (they were nothing when I was on campus…10 years ago).

Where I attended, the cost was thousands of dollars. I simply felt I could use that money more effectively. Your situation was clearly different. In any event, I applaud you for your community service.

——–

“As a skinhead or as a volunteer?”
Volunteer? Uh…ok…no. I was never a skinhead myself, but I dated several skinheads.

I meant a volunteer in order to try and educate them with regard to racial stereotypes… a practical mentor if you will. Is it safe to assume that you are black or partially black (based on your comments)? If so, how does one go about dating a skinhead?

———

“Having a “diverse set of friends” doesn’t make you immune to stereotyping”

That is very true. However, if I were a big time stereotyper, the odds that they’d still be my friends aren’t very high.

———-

“Truly open-minded people understand that internalizing a label limits your view of someone. You have shown that you are quite comfortable taking a label, and making all sorts of conclusions based off of your own LIMITED experiences and passing them off as fact. ”

In fact, what started my own decision to get the ball rolling on removing organized religion from my life was the concept of a label. I didn’t need a religious label to do good works nor to be a good person. I found that keeping the religious label was simply making me a hypocrite because there were certain aspects of it that I intentionally did not want to follow.

In your case with Judaism, if I had been in your place and had already started observing it, then I wouldn’t have felt any need to officially convert. Why? Because labels are just that… labels. But you felt otherwise and that’s what worked best in your case which is good for you.

While stereotypes are not always true, there are reasons why many of them exist. They exist because generally speaking, they are true in many instances. For instance, it is a stereotype that blacks are better athletes than whites (I’m going to use the terms “Black” and “White” for the ease of discussion). Are there some better white athletes than black athletes? Absolutely. However, if you went out to a mall and picked out people at random to participate in a decathlon, black people would be more athletic than white people generally speaking.

In terms of religious people, I’ve already explicitly stated that there are some brilliant people who are religious and there are some incredible ignorant people that are atheists. With that said, generally speaking, most religious people are those that were brainwashed from an early age with religious beliefs, most do not wholeheartedly seek out alternative religions, most do not have IQ’s at the same level of atheists (as facts support), most are very closed minded when it comes to beliefs that are not re-enforced by their religion or place of worship, etc, etc, etc

——-

“There is nothing wrong with just saying, “You know what, I don’t understand. However I am curious, and would like to hear more from you.”

I absolutely agree. If I don’t understand something or don’t know something I do ask. In fact, you can see me asking numerous questions on this site regarding items that I do not know.

———

“…ESPECIALLY when you are engaging in conversation with those very same people who live a religious life.”

I’ve lived a religious life as well. I lived with a kosher Jew in college for years. Just because I don’t have the label of “Judaism believer” associated with me doesn’t mean I don’t understand it. I don’t have the label “Klan Member” associated with myself either, but it doesn’t mean I can’t understand their naivety and what they supposedly stand for. And so on and so forth.

———

“Instead you wish to draw conclusions…instead of fostering a conversation. Very, VERY typical of those who love to stereotype.”

Once again, I have ASKED when I don’t know something. Compare that to others on here who have jumped to conclusions time and time again. Any of the information that I have stated as fact can be backed up with factual evidence.

“I’m not stereotyping you at all. You are demonstrating how you are by the things that you write. Your demeanor has nothing to do with your lack of faith. There are plenty of atheist who are open-minded and respectful of the choices that other people make (even those choices that have to do with religion).”

Sorry, but you were stereotyping me. If you knew me, you’d realize that I am the antithesis of intolerance. As ridiculous as I think organized religion is, I will still always fight FOR Christians and Jews when it comes to their Constitutional Rights. My own family is filled with religious adherents. I care about WHO a person is, not what color their skin is, not whether or not they have physical deformities, not what religion they are, not how tall they are, not what their stance on political issues are, not what their gender is, etc, etc, etc.

Harold says: “Kyle, peace to you too.”

Thank you.

——-

“But you really should give this up already – at first your comments were annoying, then kind of amusing. But as I read them again, the tone, everything about them – I’m starting to feel sorry for you.”

I’m starting to feel sorry for you as well. I answered ALL of your questions and yet you can’t answer all of mine. Instead of addressing them, you are choosing to try and play this escape card to end the discussion instead. I’ve seen it before many times, so not a big deal on my end.

I had to explain the law of averages to you, I had to explain Hitler (of all things) to you, I asked you to cite evidence about your Judaism conversion claims (which of course I didn’t receive), you continue to blindly assume that I am an atheist despite my never stating that was the case, you won’t answer how many homeless people you have living in your apparent upscale neighborhood, you won’t answer how many Muslims live in your neighborhood, you can’t discern between a suspicion and a fact, you won’t admit that if you were born in Iran or Tibet that you wouldn’t be a member of Judaism, etc, etc, etc.

And of course, you won’t provide your stance on gay marriage despite your massive level of supposed tolerance. You know, that same level of anti-discrimination that the Orthodox Jews you speak so highly of use to still discriminate against women within their religious community by not allowing them the same equality as men. Etc.

And while Judaism as a whole is more tolerant of groups such as gays as compared to Christianity, they both still “use” religion as a shield to mask their own personal xenophobia. And to be clear, I don’t know your stance, so I’m not pretending that I do. What I can say though is that if someone asked me, I’d come right out and say that I am for equal rights for ALL people without hesitation.

In the end, holding delusional beliefs doesn’t benefit anyone who holds them. You are SO confident and secure in your Jewish faith, yet if you were born in say Ireland, you’d almost certainly be a Roman Catholic zealot defending the Catholic Church despite them abusing children left and right. You’d be in a pub drinking a pint instead of living in the Middle East claiming how peaceful it is there. It makes absolutely no logical sense to hold these beliefs concerning the afterlife when if you were born in Tibet, your view of the afterlife would be COMPLETELY different.

In any event, I wish you good luck, would encourage you to stand up for the rights of those still not given full equality within sects of Judaism and to support Israel and Palestine reaching a peace accord (even if it means sacrificing some of the 1967 land) so that a group that preaches peace can actually live in peace for once and so the rest of the world doesn’t have to continue to suffer as a result.

Just remember, if every single person who adheres to religion stopped wasting their time following made up rituals, stopped wasting time attending places of worship, stopped wasting time praying, etc and INSTEAD used every second of that time to go out and shelter the homeless, feed the hungry, educate the uneducated, etc, etc, etc… this world would be a MUCH, MUCH, MUCH better place in which to live.

Peace brother!

Rishona writes: “Oh my! Please, please, PLEASE….I beg of you; Google ‘skinhead’ and all of the links on the first page will help you see the light!”

Wow… for someone who encourages people to ask questions, you sure have a classy way of answering them. The all-tolerant one facetiously mocks the questioner by acting as if I am ignorant for not knowing the entire history of some random group like the skinheads.

LOL… yes, you are tolerant indeed. A simple kind explanation would have been in line with someone who is tolerant. Especially considering that if you asked 100 Jews at your place of worship what the skinheads were, the vast majority would say a white supremacist group. I wonder if you would have told those Jews you worship with: “Oh my! Please, please, PLEASE….I beg of you; Google ‘skinhead’ and all of the links on the first page will help you see the light!” I’ll bet instead you would have been kind and explained it with a proper tone.

It is EXACTLY this type of hypocrisy that drives non-religious people up the wall.

Let’s look at the the Golden Rule… “Do unto others as you would want them to do unto you.”

Interestingly enough, that exists in almost every religion and since G-d’s people encompass the planet, that makes far more sense than relying on a thousands of years old book written by uneducated men and a corrupt machine that is organized religion to rule one’s life:

Bahá’í Faith: “And if thine eyes be turned towards justice, choose thou for thy neighbour that which thou choosest for thyself.”

Brahmanism: “Do naught unto others which would cause you pain if done to you.”

Buddhism: “Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.”

Confucianism: “Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.”

Egyptian: “Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do.”

Hinduism: “This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you.”

Humanism: “Don’t do things you wouldn’t want to have done to you.”

Islam: “None of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.”

Jainism: “In happiness and suffering, in joy and grief, we should regard all creatures as we regard our own self.”

Judaism: “What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man. This is the law: all the rest is commentary.”

Native American: “Do not wrong or hate your neighbor. For it is not he who you wrong, but yourself.”

Shinto: “The heart of the person before you is a mirror. See there your own form.”

Sikhism: “No one is my enemy, none a stranger and everyone is my friend.”

Taoism: “Regard your neighbor’s gain as your own gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss.”

Yoruba: “One going to take a pointed stick to pinch a baby bird should first try it on himself to feel how it hurts.”

Zoroastrianism: “Whatever is disagreeable to yourself do not do unto others.”

In the end, it is obvious that all religions share this theme. That is the rule to follow, not because it is in some book, but because it is shared across religions and humanity. If you were born in Tibet or Iran, you’d still be following that rule. Logic dictates this is FAR more sensible.

So perhaps you should be practicing a little more of what you preach.

In any event, best wishes to you.

Peace!

Hi Rishona,

Unfortunately, Kyle seems more interested in trying to convince everyone how smart he thinks he is and how dumb he thinks everyone else is than in any kind of serious engagement. As you’ve seen, he’s so wrapped up in presenting the “facts” as he sees them, that he’s oblivious to how he comes off. He thinks very highly of himself – so much so that he can’t see any of the flaws in his arguments (actually many more flat-out declarative statements than arguments in the true sense of the word) I’ve had many good conversations with skeptics of all types, as I’m sure you have too. And when a skeptic is truly open to dialogue, it makes for an enriching conversation. But as you’ve seen, this is someone whose postings would make better material for a grad. student in psychology than they would for any serious discussion about religion. As the Book of Proverbs puts it – Do not argue with a fool. I only regret that I responded to Kyle for as long as I did – I’m sure we both have much more productive things we could be doing.

You’re right Harold. But i should just put it out there that I have no desire to change Kyle or his thought process. If anything, I am just trying to show the larger public that the label “religious” does not equate to being “X”, “Y”, “Z” or a whole host of various stereotypes that people would attribute to us. Most hate and disdain stems from ignorance. I think that this comment thread makes this readily apparent. As far as time, you also have a point. I could have been spending time updating my website…and this thread was inspiration for that. If anyone wants to take a gander, check out http://www.rishonan.net later today!

I completely agree, Rishona – the goal is not to convince the other person that you’re right and they’re wrong, but to have an open and honest dialogue where both sides can learn, be challenged, etc. Unfortunately, if people are interested in maintaining their little stereotypes, they’ll hold on to them for dear life no matter what we say or how we say it. I will take a look at your web site – thanks!

Rishona writes: “So Kyle you would rather spend your time typing all of these opinions that you believe to be facts than to spend 2 seconds researching something on Google (so no interest in self-educating)? Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! Wow…just wow.”

Please. You know perfectly well what I was talking about. It was about the principle of the matter and the tone in which you used. Your tone here with “Wow… just wow” just further drives home my point.

To pretend that you don’t know what I was inferring, when you clearly did, and then try to play it off as if you didn’t know is pretty much lying according to the 10 Commandments… or do you simply have a loophole for that so you can hide behind your religion yet again instead of simply owning up to it?

And BTW, I did self-educate myself on the matter and I learned something new, which is more than I can say for the closed mindedness of certain people on here.

Peace!

Harold writes: “Unfortunately, Kyle seems more interested in trying to convince everyone how smart he thinks he is and how dumb he thinks everyone else is than in any kind of serious engagement.”

LOL… you won’t even answer my questions coward. How am I supposed to “seriously engage” with someone who won’t reciprocate? I’ll ask you about gay marriage now for the umpteenth time AGAIN.

—–

“As you’ve seen, he’s so wrapped up in presenting the “facts” as he sees them”

LOL… you haven’t even asked for the evidence to support them! Yet when I ask you to back up your claims, of course you can’t do it. You are delusional.

———-

“that he’s oblivious to how he comes off”

Yeah, I only have a PhD in Communication from one of the most prestigious universities anywhere on the planet. So yes, I have no idea of how I come off on a message board. What a joke. It’s more like YOU don’t understand how you come off.

I’ll tell you what… go and print up our thread, black out our names, take them to a neutral location where someone is not Jewish nor whatever you think I am, and ask them to tell you unbiasedly who is owning this argument.

——-

“He thinks very highly of himself – so much so that he can’t see any of the flaws in his arguments”

LMAO… how many logic units have you taken in college Harold? Shall we compare? You think they are flawed because you have been brainwashed and are delusional when it comes to the topic of religion.

———

“And when a skeptic is truly open to dialogue, it makes for an enriching conversation.”

Once again, you can’t even answer my questions. I’ll ask you AGAIN here, in case you missed it the other countless times I’ve asked you: What is your stance on gay marriage? And that is only ONE of the questions you chickened out on.

——-

“But as you’ve seen, this is someone whose postings would make better material for a grad. student in psychology than they would for any serious discussion about religion.”

Yeah, I have a minor in psychology. Would you like to discuss it in depth? I have already mentioned the DSM here and based on your delusion, you fit the criteria for a mental illness… congrats on that.

——

“As the Book of Proverbs puts it – Do not argue with a fool. I only regret that I responded to Kyle for as long as I did – I’m sure we both have much more productive things we could be doing.”

Ah yes, the coward who can’t answer my questions now responds in the third person by calling me a fool indirectly… that’s VERY tolerant and VERY classy indeed. You are supposed to be above petty things like that, but you are not. It is hypocritical. But it’s OK, you can just follow your faith whenever it is convenient for you and ignore it when it is not convenient, just like the majority of religious zealots. Oh wait, now I’m going to get accused of stereotyping, despite it being factual in my own experiences with thousands upon thousands of people I’ve discussed this topic with.

Fricken’ hilarious!

Peace!

ishona writes: “Most hate and disdain stems from ignorance.”

I agree.

——–

“I think that this comment thread makes this readily apparent.”

I’ll ask you for a second time, what is your stance on gay marriage?

———–

On your site, you state: “But as always, a token atheist has popped up and feels compelled to engage the religious commenters in a debate over G-d and the pointlessness of religion.”

LOL… You are STILL saying I’m an atheist despite my saying not to jump to conclusions about it over and over and over again on here. What part of this statement on here are you and Harold incapable of comprehending? “This isn’t to say that there isn’t a Supreme Being (as one cannot disprove a negative), just that it isn’t the one from the Bible.” Does that sound like I am some hard core atheist to you? Really? But hey, think whatever you want because that is what has been happening here with the people I’ve been conversing with. Those people just ignore reality and facts and instead live inside their own bubble of delusion.

——–

On your site, you state: “the scope of G-d’s knowledge and feelings is something that I as a human cannot even begin to fathom.”

So you are saying that G-d is uber intelligent. If you realize that G-d is uber intelligent, then you’d realize that he has nothing to do with Abrahamic faiths that contradict themselves constantly. Thus, either you believe that G-d is an idiot (which it sounds like you don’t believe) or you believe that G-d didn’t have anything to do with the writing of those texts.

——

On your site, you state: “But computers cannot philosophize. No matter how much information they can retain and store, the intelligence of a computer and the intelligence of a human being are still light-years apart.”

That depends on your perspective. My wife is a professor at Stanford with her PhD in philosophy. What you are saying isn’t necessarily true. As for the difference between a human and a computer, you can start your exploration with Alan Turing who I believe started this discussion way back in the 1950′s (give or take some).

——-

On your site, you state: “Well G-d is not a human.”

You don’t know that. For all you know, you could be living inside a virtual reality that was created by humans… you own self-conscious SIM if you will. In fact, our whole world is ironically made up of complex pixels of sorts. Do I subscribe to this theory? Not really, but others have offered this as a possibly, so if you were truly open-minded, then you’d keep options such as those on the table since they are theoretically possible.

——-

On your site, you state: “But let’s say, for arguement’s sake, that G-d is not real.”

You have hope yet. lol

——-

On your site, you state: “Let’s use an analogy; marriage. G-d’s relationship with Israel (his people) is often equated to a marriage. Now there may be some exceptions to the rule, but most people go into a marriage with a clear commitment to the other person.”

What an interesting choice of analogy. Did you not see earlier when I said: “Atheists/Agnostics have lower rates of divorce than Jews, Christians and even the Mormons. Those religions are sure strengthening the bonds of “holy” matrimony indeed. But hey, what do facts matter in a world of delusion?”

Thus, in your analogy, if you want to equate G-d to marriage, then you should equate him to the atheists and agnostics since they have better outcomes on the marriage front.

——

On your site, you state: “Getting back to G-d, we cannot begin to fathom his level of commitment to us”

I agree which is why it is funny that G-d created atheists with higher IQ’s and lower divorce rates than his devout followers. So maybe G-d favors them.

——

On your site, you state: “Our lifetimes are limited…G-d’s is infinite.”

Our lifetimes are CURRENTLY limited. Science may or may not change that in the future. As for G-d, we don’t know if he is infinite or not. Let’s say God did create the universe… maybe he spontaneously combusted afterwards. You say that as if it is fact when it is NOT fact… it is a delusion to assume that is fact.

——-

On your site, you state: “Oh well G-d hasn’t appeared to people in my lifetime, or in my parents’ lifetimes, or in any time in recent history.”

There has always been a God… . I’ll list them out for everyone:

45,000 BC – Worship took place in ritualistic burial sites in Africa, Europe and Asia.

15,000 BC – Animal gods were worshipped.

6,000 BC – The Tigris/Euphrates was the home to “civilization” where they worshipped the sun god A-nu and the mother god Inanna along with a plethora of other gods.

4,004 BC – Bishop Ussher declared this the date that your God created the Earth. LOL

2,800 BC – The Pharaoh is both King and God simultaneously.

2,000 BC – The birth of Judaism begins.

1,750 BC – Stonehenge is built possibly as a temple to worship the Sun God.

1,500 BC – The Hindus write the Rig Vega WAY before the Bible.

1,385 BC – The Egyptians go to monotheism of Aton, the Sun God.

1,100 BC – Charlton Heston, I mean Moses, received the Ten Commandments.

950 BC – Brahminism begins in India teaching about the concept of a soul.

900 BC – The huge list of Greek gods are created.

750 BC – The Romans go with their set of gods.

650 BC – Zoroastrianism is born (possibly as early as 1,500 BC).

600 BC – Jews write the Old Testament.

550 BC – Jainism is born.

525 BC – Taoism is born.

500 BC – Confucianism is born.

500 BC – Buddhism is born.

Around 0 (give or take 10 years) – Jesus is finally born.

470 AD – Mayans elevate Xpiyacoc and Xmucane as creators of the universe.

600 AD – Muhammad founds Islam and Allah is the supreme god.

1200 AD – Zen is born.

1230 AD – The Catholic Church goes on their murder spree with the Inquisition.

1500 AD – Martin Luther splits the Church.

1550 AD – Copernicus says the Earth revolves around the sun. The Church believed God created Earth as the center of the Universe. (DO YOU KNOW WHY? BECAUSE THEY WERE COMPLETELY UNEDUCATED MEN READING A BOOK CREATED BY EVEN LESS EDUCATED MEN!!)

1600 AD – The Catholic Church has Bruno BURNED AT THE STAKE for suggesting that stars could be suns. LMAO

1776 – US is born.

1850 – Darwin does his thing.

1900 – Einstein’s theory of relativity.

1980′s – Jedi Religion is born. LOL

Modern Day – Man has now become God with the ability to clone and to destroy all life on Earth.

So yes, there is always a god… just a different one. The Biblical God didn’t care about anyone until 2,000 BC and didn’t care about anyone in North nor South America until around 1,500.

And what do most of the items on that list have in common? The answer is that they were ALL CERTAIN that they had the “right” religion.. which is EXACTLY what believers today say about their current religion. And what else do they have in common? They were all wrong.

Don’t shoot the messenger… just providing the facts.

——-

On your site, you state: “Jews believe in some inaccurate things too…so no group of humans is exempt from that.”

I’m glad you recognize that. That is step number 1. Now when you come to the realization that YOU DO NOT need to be a part of a larger group that DOES believe in inaccurate things, then you’ll be ahead of the game.

——-

On your site, you state: “But babies and young children are much purer.”

That is true, but they are also display a much greater level of naivety which is why they are the demographic (grade school children) that believe in God the most (along with the Tooth Fairy, Santa, the Boogeyman, etc).

—-

On your site, you state: “when a soul reaches a fetus, that personal encounter with the Creator is very powerful….and lingers for a long time. ”

Once again, you state this as if it is somehow a fact, when in REALITY, no one knows this one way nor the other.

——–

On your site, you state: “adults need religion more than anything.”

I couldn’t disagree more. Adults need logic, critical thinking skills, education, common sense and love more than anything.

If they have those 5 staples, then God will or won’t be apparent to them. As mentioned, the people with the highest IQ’s are atheists and the countries with the highest IQ’s tend to not have super strong religious beliefs while the countries with the lowest IQ’s are extremely religiously devout.

———-

On your site, you state: “To be fair to all (including atheists), I will be the first to say that it is not easy.”

I know it isn’t easy because I’ve been on your side of the fence. In fact, breaking free of religion was one of the hardest things for me to do. The years and years of brainwashing were extremely powerful and grab hold of you like glue.

The reason why you say it isn’t easy is because DEEP down inside, your logic and common sense are telling you otherwise. The good news is at least you are open enough to realize that it isn’t easy and hopefully someday you’ll be strong enough to be truthful with yourself and utilize common sense, courage and reason when it comes to your faith. The only person you’ll be helping is yourself… and I speak from personal experience. Breaking free was difficult, but now I am SO much happier being freed from the chains of ancient religions.

———

“If anyone wants to take a gander, check out http://www.rishonan.net later today!”

You did a nice job on your site… congrats!

FYI… Ziggy’s new album is excellent. I just purchased it the other day. Also the “One Love: A Bob Marley All-Star Tribute” is one of my all time favorite DVD’s if you haven’t seen it… it has everyone from Tracy Chapman to Chrissie Hynde singing Bob’s songs.

And if you want a quote from Bob that is apropos to this thread and discussion, “Emancipate yourself from mental slavery; None but ourselves can free our own minds.” Now those are truly wise words indeed.

Peace!

TO EVERYONE:

I hope you can go back and read through the conversations and see the blatant hypocrisy that abounds from the people I’ve had conversations with. Of the three main participants (Debbie, Harold and Rishona), I’ve been name called, not treated with the level of respect these people preach they show toward others and been cut off from them having a conversation because they are scared to answer my questions.

It is really quite pathetic. But I’ve seen it before over and over again and this is nothing new. People that are religious will only go so far in a logical conversation and then they quit when they reach a certain level. That certain level is one where they know they will look foolish if they cross a certain logical threshold. In this case, Debbie, Harold and Rishona REFUSED to answer my questions about gay marriage despite my asking over and over and over again.

So they refuse to answer it (I think we all know why) and then they run around with their self-righteous preaching talking about how absolutely “tolerant” they are thanks to Judaism!!! LMAO!!!!!!!!!! It is beyond hilarious!!!

In contrast, there is myself… the same person who these “tolerant” and “non-brainwashed” and supposedly “intelligent” people call an “atheist” over and over and over again (despite my stating that I hadn’t ruled out the existence of a Supreme Being). Yes, these people are mental giants indeed. If someone asked me about gay marriage, I’d come right out and stand up for equality. But hey, too bad I don’t have those amazing religious “values” that could teach me the same level of “tolerance” as the Jews here that I’ve spoken with so that way I could simply go and hide behind my fictional religious book like an enormous coward.

In fact, someone could ask me about ANYTHING and I could give an honest answer to it. Why? Because I have NOTHING to hide. They don’t want to answer the simple gay question because deep down inside, they know it is isn’t tolerant and that they are hypocrites… however, they don’t even have the moral backbone to come out and simply admit it. Very noble indeed.

And do you want to know the ultimate irony? That irony is that IF Judaism taught that under all circu-mstances, gay marriage was to be embraced, then these EXACT same people would be running out full speed trying to be the first one to say that gay marriage was definitely a good thing! LOL!!! And do you know WHY that is? It is because these people are so brainwashed that they let OTHERS (their religion) THINK FOR THEM. It is beyond sad.

If they REALLY loved their G-d, they’d spend less time worrying about leaving out the “O” in his name (as if he cares) and spend more time worrying about why they are discriminating against God’s own children and why they are allowing other humans to manipulate their own brains that their G-d gave them.

But hey, I am the ignorant one here apparently. I am the intolerant one. It must have been because I made logical arguments that I could back up with credible facts, that I was the one who had enough control of my hubris to apologize on multiple occasions and who consistently wished Peace to the people who disagreed with me. If only I religion… then instead I could be like the people here who support fiction over reality, who don’t like to apologize because their hubris is out of this world, who try to put people down and discriminate against others while hypocritically saying how tolerant they are.

Yeah, thank goodness for organized religion. Combine those aforementioned items (which are clearly illustrated here to any unbiased person) along with the facts that religious people have the lowest IQ’s of the 4 groups mentioned, that they have higher rates of divorce than atheists/agnostics and that they live in a world of delusion which is an actual mental illness as defined by the DSM…. Gee… where can I sign up?!?

In any event, this is meant to hopefully be an eye-opener to a few of the people reading this that might actually be open minded (e.g. Anna H and others that haven’t spoken up). Be HONEST with yourselves!!! If you believe the scriptures are 100% inerrant, then you MUST think God is an incompetent simpleton because they conflict themselves over and over again. If you think that some of the stories are just fictional parables, then ask yourself why you are believing in a book that YOU KNOW is partly fiction, but the people who wrote it would have believed it to be 100% true… that completely places the level of any validity to the rest of it in massive doubt. It is BASIC common sense.

I wish everyone here good luck (including the people who I’ve conversed with who have put me down, discriminate against others and were too cowardly to answer my questions)! Genuine wishes of peace to all of you in the future!

Cheers!

TO EVERYONE (Post #2):

In an effort to shatter this ridiculous notion of gays being “bad” in the eyes of G-d, here is a post I have written directed toward Christianity in the past. This was from a site that limited the number of characters in my responses, so I quickly created the site in the link below as a means of properly responding to questions (then I would post the link as my official response elsewhere). I am in no way “pitching” this site as it has been over a year since i have posted there and am only referencing it for the archived information that still resides there. The format there will be nicer to read than my reposting it here.

I’ll let the Jews here remove the “Christian” parts and insert beliefs from your own religion’s belief schema in their place. The scientific facts remain a constant as do other items that are shared between the two Abrahamic Faiths. Hopefully, you can use logic and intelligence to enter the world of reality and anti-discrimination in the process. Enjoy:

————-

http://uscatholic.yuku.com/topic/21

————-

Peace!

good comment kyle about the pepsi & birth location. i will be interested to hear debbies response.

Anna H, I refuse to further engage Kyle and give him any more fodder for his ignorant hate-filled tirades. Anyone who REALLY wants to engage in a respectful debate, give me an e-mail to contact you at and I will be pleased to debate. But I’m not going to continue.engaging this narrow minded person.

Debbie (compugraphd) writes: “I refuse to further engage Kyle and give him any more fodder for his ignorant hate-filled tirades.”

Where am I hate filled? I’ll GUARANTEE that my inner circle of friends is FAR more ethnically and religiously diverse than yours. I have a double digit number of “godchildren” from 4 different races.

In fact, I just argued in favor of keeping circ-umcision legal on CBS a few weeks ago despite it being linked closely to Judaism. It has to do with logic and nothing to do with hate.

But speaking of “ignorant hate,” how do you feel about gays? (And not that it matters, but no I am not gay.) Do you support gays’ right to marriage here in America?

—————–

“Anyone who REALLY wants to engage in a respectful debate”

Have I not been respectful to you? Heck, I even respected you enough to pull the “o” out of G-d just for you (despite that being silly IMHO just like the use of a microphone). I could go in depth as why from a linguistics perspective it is silly, but I won’t unless you are interested.

So let’s look at who has disrespected whom in just your very first post:

1) In your VERY first line to me, you called me ignorant.

2) Then despite you not knowing my background, you then say, “if you knew anything about Judaism.” Pretty presumptuous and a veiled attempt at a put down.

3) Then you have the audacity to say, “Judaism is about being a good person, treating others with respect.” This was after you just finished calling me ignorant. Good thing there is no hypocrisy there.

In subsequent posts you said the following directed toward me:

4) Called me self-righteous.

5) Inferred that I have a superiority complex.

6) Say that choose to belittle others in the same breath that you are attempting to belittle me. lol

7) Call me ignorant AGAIN.

8) Say that I am hate-filled.

So really Debbie, who is the one being disrespectful? How many names have I called you? Have I not treated you with the same amount of respect or better than what you’ve treated me with???

Which one of us has been the least biased? I have admitted science doesn’t have all the answers and I’ve even pointed out where you and I agree.

———–

“give me an e-mail to contact you at and I will be pleased to debate.”

I’m right here in a public forum. If you are correct and I am incorrect, then you should have no problem having this discussion with me right here.

I have answered ALL of your questions. Yet I ask you some simple ones and you run and hide. Those weren’t intrusive questions whatsoever. They were basic, logical, common sense questions.

And let’s be honest, the reason why you don’t want to answer them is because DEEP down inside, you know I am correct. If you were born in Iran, you’d be INSISTING that Allah is the “correct” God to follow and that the Jewish religion is not the correct one. If you were born in Tibet, you’d be saying the Jewish religion is not correct and that Buddha is the path to enlightenment. And so on and so forth. Just admit that this is true. To deny it is to deny all reality.

And you won’t answer the question about the Mosque, Hindu Temple, etc because you know DEEP down inside that you spend longer picking out your favorite flavor of ice cream at Baskin Robbins than you have exploring other religions with the same level of zeal that you have explored Judaism with. Let’s be honest, you’ve spent more time shopping for cars you have purchased than you have “shopping” for a religion.

————

“But I’m not going to continue.engaging this narrow minded person.”

Oh look… #9 on the list… now I am narrow minded. I’ve explored all the major religions in depth… have you? I’ve been to a wide variety of places of worship… have you? I’m the one willing to debate with someone who has beliefs different than my own… while you are tucking tail and disengaging. I am the one offering up concepts that go against conventional thinking while you are following the predictable religious script. So which of the two of us is narrow minded?

You have a self-imposed law in place to treat others with respect due to your religion. I have no such constraints as I don’t need to claim a title to make me feel important. That means I can do as I please. And yet which of the two of us is showing more respect toward the other? I think we both know the answer to that one.

I’m still waiting to hear the answers to my questions…

Peace Debbie!

i am saddened to hear debbies response as not talking about differences doesnt result in positive change on either side, but she is entitled to do as she wishes.

kyle, ive been thinking more about your pepsi & birth location comment i mentioned earlier. i grew up with judaism & my family are still strong in their faith. however, if i am being truthful with myself, if i were born in iran i would be a believer of alllah instead of my current faith. that is a great point because what does my religion really say about me if i wouldn’t believe in it based on where i was born or what religion my family already adhered to? that doesnt make it some intellectual choice, but instead one of random happenstance.

while i am not ready to give up my faith, it does give me some serious questions that i need to ponder moving forward. i have been a believer since as long as i can remember. you call this brainwashing which might be too strong of a term, but that is a result of my upbringing, not of my own independent choice.

while i might not end up agreeing when all is said & done, i do appreciate you challenging me.

enjoy your weekend!
-A

“Where am I hate filled?” Wow! You really don’t get it do you? If you can read your own remarks and not see any hate in them, then you are the one living your life on a set of assumptions that are highly suspect.

As for the Pepsi analogy (and this goes to your point also, Anna H), it doesn’t really wash. First, one does not need to try every religion before settling on one – have you tried everything out there before settling on secularism? Second, having spoken with many converts to Judaism from a variety of religions, I do have some sense of why they chose Judaism and not the religion they were born into (I’m talking about people who were devout and knowledgeable in their former religion, not those who happened to be born into it, or rejected an 12 year old version of their religion).

Third, and most important, Kyle, I would suggest you learn more about Judaism before offering such strong opinions about it. Unlike several other major religions, Judaism does not claim that everyone needs to adhere to it. Judaism makes the unique claim that the Jews’ covenant with God imposes certain obligations on them, not on everyone else. That is why Jews don’t actively seek converts. That is why Carolyn Fine chose to follow her beliefs, but didn’t for one minute suggest that others had to do the same. She did not suggest that the school move the ceremony for her – she just stuck to her beliefs.

It’s hard to understand why you have such a problem with that. There are many assumptions of secularism that one could pick apart in a really nasty way, accuse people like you of living a fantasy, etc. I wouldn’t do that however (nor, you will notice, have the religious people on this site), because it’s not respectful. You, however, have no problem with being disrespectful of others’ religious beliefs even as you profess open-mindedness and tolerance.

Again, before you tear apart Judaism in such a disrespectful way, I would urge you to learn more about it (and please don’t say that you already know all about it, because your comments betray an ignorance of the religion).

Harold says: “Wow! You really don’t get it do you? If you can read your own remarks and not see any hate in them, then you are the one living your life on a set of assumptions that are highly suspect.”

There is a difference between “hate” and “reality.” If you were sitting here saying that the Earth is only a handful of thousands of years old (like many religious delusional people actually believe) and I was sitting here telling you that it is delusional, you’d be saying the EXACT same thing to me.

The only difference is that now you are unable to see your own delusion because you are currently living it so deeply that it seems like reality to you.

Or if it simplifies it for you, think of a child that believes in say Santa or the Tooth Fairy… if you tell that child they are not real, that child perceives “reality” as simply being “hate” toward Santa or the Tooth Fairy because that child has been brainwashed by their parents into a world of delusion. (and for the record, I have no problem with kids believing in Santa or the Tooth Fairy because eventually parents tell them the truth about it and turn their delusion back into reality.)

——-

“As for the Pepsi analogy (and this goes to your point also, Anna H), it doesn’t really wash.”

Yes it does. Anna was just able to exercise multi-dimensional thinking to realize it. Kudos to you Anna!

———

“First, one does not need to try every religion before settling on one – have you tried everything out there before settling on secularism?”

LOL… one does not NEED to indeed. I don’t NEED to drive a bunch of cars before buying one either. Let’s say that I win a game show who gives me a blank check to purchase ANY car I want to. Let’s say that the very first car that is shown to me is a 1971 Ford Pinto. Do I NEED to try more before settling on that one? Absolutely not. I could simply take it. OR I could be intelligent and look at a wide variety of cars and end up with a McLaren F1 or an Aston Martin or even a high end Mercedes or Lexus.

If you were in that same situation, you’d be out test driving cars left and right. In fact, you would spend MORE time test driving different models than you would have done choosing your own religion! Yet you can’t see how absolutely naive that is. You’d actually spend more time shopping for a car than you did shopping for your eternal salvation.

So let me ask you:

1) What is the religion of your parents?

2) What is your religion?

3) How many different religions have you considered yourself to be a devout follower of in your lifetime?

4) How many years have you spent as a non-believer?

I have a sneaky suspicion we both already know the answers to those questions.

——–

“Second, having spoken with many converts to Judaism from a variety of religions, I do have some sense of why they chose Judaism and not the religion they were born into (I’m talking about people who were devout and knowledgeable in their former religion, not those who happened to be born into it, or rejected an 12 year old version of their religion).”

Let’s be brutally honest here… the main reason why people convert to Judaism is because of marriage. And why do they feel the need to do this? The answer is because their partner is a someone who resides outside the world of reality and common sense and feels the need to cling to an ancient religion. They believe that this will strengthen their marriage when in fact, as I’ve already shown, the odds that they’d stay married increase if they both rejected organized religion.

———

“Third, and most important, Kyle, I would suggest you learn more about Judaism before offering such strong opinions about it.”

I would suggest that you not make uneducated statements and present them as if they were fact. You have no idea how much or how little I know about Judaism.

——–

“Unlike several other major religions, Judaism does not claim that everyone needs to adhere to it. Judaism makes the unique claim that the Jews’ covenant with God imposes certain obligations on them, not on everyone else. That is why Jews don’t actively seek converts.”

Aren’t you merely just playing a game of semantics? If it is truly unique unto the Jewish people, then why accept converts at all? The Jewish people proselytize their faith on message boards, just like Christians do. Christians don’t go door to door like Mormons, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t happy when someone does convert. However, I will say that generally speaking, the Jews are the least “active” in that sense of those three religions just mentioned.

——

“That is why Carolyn Fine chose to follow her beliefs, but didn’t for one minute suggest that others had to do the same. She did not suggest that the school move the ceremony for her – she just stuck to her beliefs.”

And once again, as a citizen of the US, I support her right to do this. No one ever tried to force her to speak.

And while she didn’t ask the ceremony to be moved for her, she took the spotlight off of the other countless grads and instead put it on herself and her religion. The other students were graduating just like she was and deserved the spotlight to be on them as well. At the same time Carolyn is still young and deserves a little bit of leeway as a result.

Finally, people are missing the point that while she has the right to do it, the entire concept is simply delusional. It is great to see a young person stand up for what they believe in despite the majority on one hand, yet on the other hand it is sad to see someone of such great academic intelligence lack real world critical thinking skills and let some religious zealots think FOR her by telling her crazy things like using a microphone is a bad thing on such and such a day. It lacks rational sense.

———

“It’s hard to understand why you have such a problem with that. There are many assumptions of secularism that one could pick apart in a really nasty way, accuse people like you of living a fantasy, etc.”

You are going to accuse me of living in a fantasy world because I don’t believe in a book written by uneducated men several millennia ago? You are going to accuse me of living in a fantasy world because I don’t believe in a negative that is impossible to disprove? By all means, “pick it apart in a really nasty way” as I’d love to hear it because unlike others in the religious sector, I have no fear in hearing opposing points of view as I constantly challenge my beliefs.

——-

“I wouldn’t do that however (nor, you will notice, have the religious people on this site), because it’s not respectful.”

Like I said, go for it. I am a big boy and won’t be offended. One can have an ideological debate while it still having a respectable tone. As for respect, let’s look at what you’ve “called me” so far:

1) Close-minded (multiple times)

2) Extremely Judgmental

3) Hateful (multiple times)

4) Snob

5) Superiority Complex

6) Ignorant about Judaism (multiple times)

7) Living in a fantasy

8) Disrespectful

9) Anti-tolerant

So please, spare me your hypocrisy.

———

“You, however, have no problem with being disrespectful of others’ religious beliefs even as you profess open-mindedness and tolerance.”

Have I or have I not treated you and others with a similar amount of respect that has been displayed toward me?

———–

“Again, before you tear apart Judaism in such a disrespectful way, I would urge you to learn more about it (and please don’t say that you already know all about it, because your comments betray an ignorance of the religion).”

Once again, you are making assumptions. But let’s play your game for a minute and say that I just learned about Judaism today. Here’s what I need to know on a most basic level to make an argument:

1) It is based on fiction from texts written by uneducated men thousands of years ago who would have believed the Earth to be flat. The facts are that a 5th grader today knows more about the world that we live in than did the uneducated people who wrote these texts. It is ironic that you would NEVER let a 5th grader dictate the course of your life, but when it comes to religion, then it all of the sudden “magically” becomes OK to do so. It is absolutely mind-boggling.

2) Most people who believe do so because of their place of birth and religion/culture of their parents. It is classical brainwashing from an early age.

3) Most people never actively seek out other religious choices because they simply believe what they were brainwashed/raised with as a child.

4) Delusion is an actual mental illness as defined by the DSM IV.

5) Religious people can’t even agree on their OWN religion because it is so vague and you can make religion justify ANYTHING you want to based on these antiquated texts.

So let me ask you: How do you feel about gay couples getting married? How many hours have you spent at alternative places of worship (e.g. Muslim Mosques, Hindu Temples, etc?) How many other religious texts have you read cover to cover? And finally I’ll ask for answers to the other questions already posed to you.

Peace!

Anna says, “i am saddened to hear debbies response as not talking about differences doesnt result in positive change on either side, but she is entitled to do as she wishes.”

You are correct that she is entitled to do as she pleases. The reason why she won’t answer is because deep down inside, she knows the logic I am presenting is correct.

if Debbie was born in a tribe like the Yanomamo in South America and we were sitting in front of her, then she’d be sitting there right now preaching and INSISTING that shamanism is the one true religion. It wouldn’t be her fault, but rather a direct result of her place of birth.

What is her fault however is that she can’t admit that this is the case. That my friend is the result of what years of religion being drilled into someone has on the psyche… it is difficult to differentiate the truth from fantasy because they become intermingled over time.

——–

“kyle, ive been thinking more about your pepsi & birth location comment i mentioned earlier. i grew up with judaism & my family are still strong in their faith. however, if i am being truthful with myself, if i were born in iran i would be a believer of alllah instead of my current faith. that is a great point because what does my religion really say about me if i wouldn’t believe in it based on where i was born or what religion my family already adhered to? that doesnt make it some intellectual choice, but instead one of random happenstance.”

You are wise indeed and I have tremendous hope for you. It is VERY difficult to peer deep within ourselves to make such personal revelations, especially when they are contrary to what we have always believed. So big time kudos to you!

——–

“while i am not ready to give up my faith, it does give me some serious questions that i need to ponder moving forward. i have been a believer since as long as i can remember. you call this brainwashing which might be too strong of a term, but that is a result of my upbringing, not of my own independent choice. while i might not end up agreeing when all is said & done, i do appreciate you challenging me.”

In contrast to Carolyn, you show great critical thinking skills. I have no idea how you did academically in school (or if you are still in school or not), but I can tell that you will go far in life by being so open-minded and questioning yourself.

Questioning yourself is a sign of immense strength and fortitude. Compare that to others here who would rather “hide” and continue to believe their current belief schema just because that is what they have always done, regardless if it makes logical sense or not.

You shouldn’t rush to do anything. Just keep challenging yourself and reading viewpoints opposite of your own as that is the path to enlightenment.

Looking at other religions and keeping an open mind about your current religion by challenging your current belief schema will do one of the following:

1) Either make you realize that there is a better option for you than your current religion or belief system.

2) Strengthen your current beliefs by realizing that you’ve ruled out some other options.

It is truly a win-win situation, yet hardly anyone “really” does this wholeheartedly.

——

“enjoy your weekend!”

Thank you… I hope you enjoyed yours as well. Good luck in your journey!

Peace!

Kyle, you should call your bluff…and have the comment thread reviewed by unbiased individual. I work at a university…so there are plenty of professors around of all pursuasions. However I’m not interested in doing so, because I have no interest in being declared “a winner”. I am happy with my lifestyle and my choices. I am also happy at the diversity of outlooks that this world presents. Are you? So please, don’t be so insecure. Your efforts to pick apart people’s words with responses that basically translate as “I know you are, but what am I?” type of dribble is hardly based in logic, common sense, or anything praiseworthy in the least. Not to mention the countless times your retort to disparaging remarks (i.e. “religious zealots”, “brainwashed”, “delusional”). If you can figure out how to converse without insulting the receiving party, you would increase your communication skills tenfold.

Take care…it’s been real. :-/

Rishona writes: “Kyle, you should call your bluff…and have the comment thread reviewed by unbiased individual. I work at a university…so there are plenty of professors around of all pursuasions.”

By all means, go for it.

——

“However I’m not interested in doing so, because I have no interest in being declared “a winner”.”

Of course not. (BTW… periods go inside the quotation marks at the end of a sentence.)

——–

“I am happy with my lifestyle and my choices.”

Congrats… so were the Branch Davidians. So were the Greeks. So were the Pharaohs. So were the Christians who just gave millions of dollars to Harold Camping (the religious nut that said the world was going to end a month or so ago). Etc, etc, etc.

——

“I am also happy at the diversity of outlooks that this world presents. Are you?”

Well, let’s see…. I’ve been to 49 of the 50 states, every province in Canada and to 6 different continents. I’ll let you surmise the answer.

——-

“So please, don’t be so insecure.”

I’m not the one running around joining groups to make me feel secure. I’m the one who left the group because I was secure enough to be independent.

——–

“Your efforts to pick apart people’s words with responses that basically translate as “I know you are, but what am I?”

Yes factual information is horrific indeed. I should just start spewing out delusion instead. Did I tell you about the time that I swallowed by a big fish (whale… despite whales being mammals) and lived inside of it for three days? OK, now we are on the same intellectual level.

———-

“type of dribble is hardly based in logic, common sense, or anything praiseworthy in the least.”

LOL… how many logic units did you take in college?

———-

“Not to mention the countless times your retort to disparaging remarks (i.e. “religious zealots”, “brainwashed”, “delusional”).”

I treat people as how they treated me. Go look at Anna H who treated me with respect… she got the same level of respect back despite us having opposing views. I’m not sure why this concept is so difficult to grasp.

Moreover, YOU and the other Jews/Christians have a higher standard that is self-imposed than what I have. I can name call all I want because I’m not claiming to be a follower of an organized faith that dictates kindness and tolerance while you are. Yet I am still on par with the others here. What you and others here are doing is outright hypocrisy, what I am doing is just in slightly bad taste at worst. As for the terms “brainwashing, delusional and zealots,” what terms would you rather I use? Do I really need to sugar coat things while I’m dancing around on eggshells?

As already mentioned, I’ve APOLOGIZED several times on here… how many religious people have apologized to me? Yep, that’s what I thought. I’ve even gone out of my way to use the term G-d instead of filling in the “O” out of respect for people here… I’m sure I’ve missed it a few times, but I’ve made the effort. So seriously, stop worrying about me and start worrying about yourself. At least I’m not a hypocrite.

——

“If you can figure out how to converse without insulting the receiving party”

LOL… I’ve already listed off all of the things that the “self-proclaimed tolerant” ones have called me. Once again, they have a higher self-imposed standard set than I do and I’ve been no worse than they have. So stop being biased and realize that it applies to both sides.

——-

“you would increase your communication skills tenfold.”

Do you have a PhD in it? No, that’s what I thought. But hey, I’m sure you know more than I do about it. lol I’m merely dishing it back to others how they have dished it out to me first. Once again, Anna H is a prime example. Sorry if the truth hurts.

——

“Take care…it’s been real. :-/”

Hey an emoticon… that’s actually good communication on a message board (seriously). Good job.

Take care yourself.

Peace!

Finally to Rishona:

You have talked about how I don’t have logic and common sense over and over again while implying that you do.

Despite you throwing out “put downs” toward me while preaching how “tolerant” you are and despite you not even having the basic common courtesy to say a simply “thank you” for my compliment on your site and for trying to be nice about the Ziggy and Bob “tips,” I’ll STILL give you a few words of advice:

1) It is EXTREMELY naive and foolish of you to use your real name on message boards.

2) It is naive to do it if your name is Jane Smith, never to mind having an extremely unique name such as your own that is ridiculously easy to search.

3) It is extremely naive of you to put up Bob Marley quotes on the same site that potential employers will undoubtedly search before hiring you 95% of the time.

4) On your actual resume, the “Objective” looks like it is something written by a junior high school student trying to get a job at a McDonald’s. You should get rid of that entire section and change “Objective” to “Summary” and utilize that space to further speak positively of your accomplishments to an employer and not waste space stating the obvious generic objective.

5) If I am being brutally honest with you, if I were a potential employer for you, if you came in and were awesome in the interview and then I went and Googled your name and undoubtedly came across your site, there is NO WAY that I’d hire you.

Five reasons why wouldn’t I hire you?

A) If I had someone that was so naive as to leave themselves so amazingly vulnerable to exposure for all their personal data, then I’d have to wonder what risk you would leave my company foolishly exposed to. There would be no need for me to take that risk. Heck, you have SO much personal info on your site alone, you might as well start publishing your passwords as well (facetious).

B) While the Bob Marley thing doesn’t bother me personally as I am obviously a fan, the vast majority of employers will infer that you could be a drug user. Not an intelligent move whatsoever (regardless if it is true or not). I quote Bob all the time, but I would never be so daft as to put him on a page that employers could easily reference.

C) Religion is obviously a very divisive topic and you flying your flag (literally) right on the front page will turn lots of employers off. Personally, I wouldn’t really care and would hire someone regardless of religious beliefs if I thought they were the best person for the job, but the majority of people would show a bias toward it whether they admit it or not.

D) The item like the aforementioned objective is beyond weak.

E) The rest of your resume is also weak in terms of format and content. I mean this as a compliment to you when I say you are capable of writing something MUCH better. Your writing on here is far better than many parts of your resume.

Keep in mind that not only are you leaving your entire life open to employers, you are leaving yourself open to real-life stalkers as well. People on the internet are lunatics and you should ALWAYS protect your anonymity. As just one example of many, you use words like “skinhead” on here (which you meant in a different fashion yet is still searchable), then have a picture of yourself up and because of your unique name some psychotic racist nutcase could easily find the location in which you live. The odds of that particular scenario happening are slim to none (thankfully), but it makes me wonder what else you have similarly exposed yourself to elsewhere on the net.

And just to illustrate this to you (and please know that I am not some lunatic stalker, but just trying to look out for your best interest), it took me less than one minute and three clicks to come up with *c**ee**o*t… I’m blocking out the letters for your own benefit as you’ll know what I am referring to.

Not only that, but you even give out your other “handles” on your webpage! That makes it even easier for employers and stalkers to follow you. And keep in mind, information that you post can reside on the web FOREVER, even after you remove it.

So I am telling you this for two reasons:

1) To illustrate to you that the levels of intelligence and common sense that you think you have might be overstated. You are telling me that I have no common sense, but the fact that you don’t even cover BASIC items like this (I’m not joking when I say my 12 year old niece takes more care being anonymous than you do) profoundly illustrates a total lack of common sense. And this is about your future for both jobs and your own personal well being. This should be a TOP priority for you, but common sense and intelligent critical thinking skills have let you down.

2) Most importantly, you seem like a nice young lady. You should protect yourself. The internet is filled with sc-um. And while you and I might disagree about religion and you haven’t treated me with the respect that you should have according to your beliefs (but it’s OK because religious people do it to me all the time and I’m used to it and find it amusing), I’ll still look out for you by wasting my own valuable time to make you aware of this gaping security hole you have created for yourself. Where are your religious friends looking out for you and pointing out this risk to you??? After all, if they are so intelligent, surely they’d notice right? If it were me, I’d google myself, go and find anything with personal info and change it. Change your REAL name on anything that doesn’t have to do with your resume. At this point, I might even consider changing my real name on my resume to something that you haven’t used on the internet all over the place. Perhaps use your middle name as your first name on your resume or some odd shortening of your real name like “Risha” or “Shony” or something of the like. Then if an employer sees your resume, he’ll likely google that phrase and your last name is very common.

In the future, don’t be so quick to allow your hubris to make you think you are more intelligent than what you are. But that is a lesson that will come with age and more life experience.

In any event, I wish you well in your future endeavors. This is my last transmission to you, so the final word is yours if you’d like it.

Peace!

(so don’t take what all Jews believe)

Sorry…meant to type “(so don’t take this as what all Jews believe)”

Rishona writes: “However, this is not a one-way relationship.”

Considering the G-d you worship is almost certainly fictional, yet it is.

——-

“In the same vain you ask if the American Medical Association really cares if doctors help to sell their patients’ organs on the black market. Or if a wife really cares if her husband has a baby with another woman. These things are wrong because we DO have standards and feelings. And that is what almost all religions are about…keeping some sort of standards.”

Religion is about keeping standards? It is more about imposing their own standards on society as if they have a magical monopoly on what constitutes morality.

With your points:

1) People SHOULD be allowed to sell their organs if they want to. It is because of religious zealots like many of the people here as to why it is still illegal. If someone wants to sell their kidney to someone else who wants to buy it because they are dying, then TWO of G-d’s children stay alive instead of only one. Moreover, making it legal gets rid of most of the black market and makes it harder for people to kill others and take their organs to sell because now there is a legal private market with checks and balances already in place. Moreover, the legal system allows the organs to be taken out in the best manner possible in order to have a successful transplant and the person giving up their organ also gets professional medical care and technology.

2) So you are against surrogates for couples who can’t conceive on their own? After all you don’t think that a husband should be able to have a baby with another woman. Thus, you are against one of G-d’s children being born.

What else do you oppose?

What is your stance on gay relationships and marriage?

What is your stance on Plan B? Should it be legal or illegal?

What is your stance on abortion? Should it be legal or illegal?

Etc?

Peace!