Please consider how you post in this forum.

This thread is only part of the problem unless you rename it so it actually has a religous heading or you delete it.

Originally posted by Agent47

Originally posted by Netchicken
Increasingly we have seen here a range of "nuisance" posts here.

These seem to fall into 3 types.

• Antagonism and abuse directed towards the poster.
  
• Off topic flippancy and smart comments that add nothing to the thread and only break the train of thought.
  
• Top of the head, ill considered birdbrain posts that derail the thread.
  

At some stage we have all be guilty of that (I know I have anyway). Lets clean up our act so that those who wish to discuss the topics can do so in peace.

I have already talked to some of the people here about posting, and will engage others if necessary, posts that fall into these catagories may be deleted to preserve the thread themes.

(Oh yeah, this is meant to be about CONSPIRACIES in religion, but we all sort of forget that part)

Dont try to take all my fun away! Thats for Colonel to do! like he always does! Not like he doesnt do it for a reason but still. Flippant comments are needed to break up the drudgery sometime.

[Edited on 24-2-2004 by Agent47]

LOL. Dont take the fun away

Originally posted by Netchicken
Have any religions set out to deliberatly control the masses? You would have to be a megalomaniac if you thought that your small band of followers were going to rule the world one day.

By subversive, you would have to infer that the setting up of a religion was to deliberatly undermine the current political system.

Again that may be the case, but is that the reason WHY a particular religion was set up? Nope I don't think so, those reasons are merely effects of the religion upon the society it is in.

I don't know, this could sound a LOT like the Catholic Church throughout history!

Netchicken~~in regards to your admonition, I will try to do my part. Although sometimes I have to bite my tongue and/or fingers at some of the replies. (And, I'm new here, so it must really be hard to be good if you've been around a while)
I applaud your efforts. I've seen forums go downhill with enough respect on all levels.
And, let me say, my vocabulary and writing ability has improved in the month I have been here. Thank you for letting me use my brain!!!

So I am in ghost mode now, care to tell me how freaking long your little game is gonna last?

Bring real conspiracies to the board and I get # canned for it?

Which mod did it, and why?

[Edited on 25-3-2004 by ET3]

Originally posted by Agent47
This thread is only part of the problem unless you rename it so it actually has a religous heading or you delete it.

Mods are dictators... they have complete power and they do what they like, where they like, when they like, and how they like (so long as its on ATS of course)......

oh no i should;ve kept my mouth shut they're coming to get me and throw me into an ATS concentration camp!!!

Yeah, I think i would fall under the categorie of directly insulting someone.. But, when someone posts a topic like, "Proof that God does not exist", it erks me a little.

Water conspires with the atmosphere to produce rain ...

This is a bad thing by definition? heh

The guy/gal who asked, how do we know that religion is not the conspiracy....

We do know, that it is ... It is an ET instilled program meant to bring about armeggedon ...

Look in DC, we have a supposed Christian who is hell bent on starting WWIII ... Look what the crusaders did before him...

Judaism,christianity,and Islam are beyond a doubt "the trinity of evil"
Nevermind an axis of evil, those 3 take the cake.....


~peace

Originally posted by Netchicken
Increasingly we have seen here a range of "nuisance" posts.

These seem to fall into 3 types.

• Antagonism and abuse directed towards the poster.
  
• Off topic flippancy and smart comments that add nothing to the thread and only break the train of thought.
  
• Top of the head, ill considered birdbrain posts that derail the thread.
  

I managed to find all 3 types in this thread alone. Talk about making a guy's point!

Now, which type of post is this one...

I'm not sure about 1 thing so I'm asking here to find out before I post
Would it be OK to set a topic about Priest Henry Jankowski from Gdansk, Pomerania, PL? A big scandal (knwn all over that country) has grown around him and I'd like to present this scandal in a thread

hmm don't see why not m8.
think it would fit more in the conspiracy part of the boards though

when I first found this board/forum, it seemed to be mostly scholarly and well-researched topics and posts. lately, it seems to be mostly evangelizing and personal testimony. I've even been sucked into some of that myself and I'm not that proud of it.

anyway, if it continues to slide towards this trend of personal testimonials, it's really not going to be worth visiting. Don't misunderstand, it's not really bad just yet but it does seem to be "heading south" and I can't help but notice that most of the serious scholars have disappeared.

do others agree? is it just me?

Sign me,
Concerned

I don't know , sometimes i think exactly what you're saying , but then it might be that the subjects are getting old , and they're losing their tastes like overchewn gum .

As Majic already pointed out, all three of the things that people are being admonished to not do have already been done on this very thread.

Honestly, I think that's simply the way that any forum dedicated to religious issues will be. Either that, or the personal testimonials that have also been mentioned. If there's any "debate" regarding the issues, it always, and I say necessarily, becomes bitter and personal and contentious.

Why? Because religious dogma is not objectively demonstrable. In a debate about factual matters, one can present factual evidence to support one's views, but religion specifically addresses issues about which there is little or no factual evidence, so it's largely opinion and belief. And all too often it's belief that is central to one's life, and is therefore defended at all costs.

Throughout history, the believers in one dogma have been at odds with the believers in another. Each religion has seen another as a competitor and/or enemy, and each, lacking factual evidence to support itself or to attack the enemy, has resorted to personal attacks. In recent times, there has been added an areligious dogma-- the contention that all religion is wrong-- is the enemy. This too is simply a belief-- its adherents have confusedly come to believe that the lack of evidence to support religion is evidence against it. They believe, just as the religious do, that theirs is the only truth, but they have nothing objective with which to support that belief. So they, as the religious before them, fall all too easily into personal attack to promote their belief and to oppose that of those who believe otherwise.

While I applaud the effort to remove abuse and overt contention from this forum, I don't see it really happening. So long as the subject is religion, there will be contention and strife. In the absence of objective fact, there's little left other than "I'm right and you're an idiot."

I would think that the best way to at least preserve some sort of decorum on this particular forum would be to eliminate all the threads that don't specifically address conspiracy in religion. Those matters at least are things about which one might present arguments based in fact. Let those who simply want to argue the merits of their faith (religious or areligious) go to a different forum to do so-- sort of a religious "slug fest."

OK, well I suppose it's just as well. I had some great conversations and learned a lot for almost a year on this forum but now I have a new job that keeps me too busy to come here more than every once in a great while anyway. I won't give up on it completely. I'll keep checking back from time-to-time to see if there is a return to serious scholarship.