Richard Dawkins backs atheist camp to give children 'godless alternative'

www.guardian.co.uk...


An atheist summer camp for children is to be held in the UK for the first time this year, offering a "godless alternative" to similar religious events under canvas.

Excellent news.

Glad to see a little diversity, but how long before the god-botherers start crucifying us because of this.

No seriously though this is good news

I dont really see the problem or anything with this? Although I admit I didn't read the article. If there is summer camps for religious kids why not summer camps for non religious people? I don't believe in god or anything and I have a kid and if I was going to send her to a camp I wouldnt send her to one that would preach to her... BUT I also wouldnt send her to something labeled a "atheist" camp... I'd just send her to a normal summer camp if she wanted to go...

She can make her own decision about god when shes old enough. And although I'm a atheist and my wife is christian we don't preach anything to her at all in our house


[edit on 28-6-2009 by jeasahtheseer]

Fantastic.

Aslong as they aren't preaching against any form of other religious views during this camp, or telling them that Atheists are right and Christians are wrong, then that's fine by me.

Children are very impressionable, and they have to be very carefull how they present this, or they could end up hurting that child's social skills and their ability to learn from others who have conflicting views or beliefs.

But good to see diversity as the above poster said.

Alright UK.

~Keeper

I'm sorry to say this, but not really so much, shame on those who those who organize those camps, and not because they should be ashamed not to have faith but because they will teach them ho to enclose their minds...

Mind should be very open, don't let your mind to be shut down by atheism...Really

That this world has a creator is the most obvious thing in the universe

Why atheists should publicize and make public their loss of faith ( I am sure all of the atheists are people who lost faith, no one never had faith in such a thing like a creator )?
Atheists want to fight against the faith of religions because they actually recognize there is something more, a creator...And they want to fight this thing like adolescents want to fight against rules...

Do you wanna know the consequences of those camps on young people?

. They will think life has no meaning and they will be weak in difficult period
. They will become arrogant and harsh when discussing with people who have faith in a creator. They will teach them to avoid people who believe.
. Atheism is an escaping from simple rules of life, so they will think they can do whatever they want, and they will be less respectful

Do you want to know a thing ? It's like some very conservative religious people who could say " Aliens are not present in the Bible, than they don't exist " right in front of an alien...Atheist say" Creator is in the Bible, so it doesn't exist "

Don't you notice?

I would like to add that faith should be very personal and should bring someone to think deeply about things.

Non believers ( That's what I noticed ) are always telling people " African children are dying in thousands, so the creator should not exist "
They tell people " What God did for your life? "
They should think " What I have done to bring something good to African people ? " The Good spreads if it is helped to...Many many people ( Me included in many things ) don't do anything to bring something good


[edit on 28-6-2009 by Matteo]

[edit on 28-6-2009 by Matteo]

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
Fantastic.

As long as they aren't preaching against any form of other religious views during this camp, or telling them that Atheists are right and Christians are wrong, then that's fine by me.

~Keeper

Er .. haha - sorry I find this stunning.

Do you think that on Christian camps they don't teach that atheists are wrong and Christians are right?

reply to post by Matteo

Why atheists should publicize and make public their loss of faith

What the hell are you on about ?

Faith = believing something without requiring evidence of its' reality.

Are you implying an atheist is born believing something without evidence, then as they discover there is no evidence for what they don't believe they n o longer believe it any more ?

Dear god man, this is exactly why our children deserve Atheist camps !

Originally posted by Matteo
I'm sorry to say this, but not really so much, shame on those who those who organize those camps, and not because they should be ashamed not to have faith but because they will teach them ho to enclose their minds...

Mind should be very open, don't let your mind to be shut down by atheism...Really

That this world has a creator is the most obvious thing in the universe

Why atheists should publicize and make public their loss of faith ( I am sure all of the atheists are people who lost faith, no one never had faith in such a thing like a creator )?
Atheists want to fight against the faith of religions because they actually recognize there is something more, a creator...And they want to fight this thing like adolescents want to fight against rules...


[edit on 28-6-2009 by Matteo]

Totally laughable. You infer that atheism is close minded but religion is not?!

You go further to say - why should atheists make their "LOSS OF FAITH" public? Chuckles and guffaws!

So - religions never make their views public? And when did atheists 'lose their faith'?? You're are speaking as if everyone arrives with some inbuilt 'faith' characteristic - which can only be depleted by listening to the evil atheists?

I am agnostic myself - but atheism is just as valid as religion - in fact it is kind of a religion itself, so from my view all the rules that pertain to religion equally apply to atheism.

Get off your high horses and come down and put your feet on the earth with the rest of us mere mortals.

The question of a divine creator or not is an unanswerable riddle that neither religion nor science can supply a satisfactory answer too.

If people must hold beliefs of one kind or other - as stupid as it may seem to me - then by all means let them all close their minds in a similarly open playing field.

[edit on 28-6-2009 by Amagnon]

reply to post by Amagnon


Umms...Ofcourse I think that's what they do, which is why I don't like Christian camps.

What I was saying was that these people should still respect the faiths and views of others, just like the christians should do as well.

Matteo

Why atheists should publicize and make public their loss of faith ( I am sure all of the atheists are people who lost faith, no one never had faith in such a thing like a creator )?
Atheists want to fight against the faith of religions because they actually recognize there is something more, a creator...And they want to fight this thing like adolescents want to fight against rules...

Atheist---Atheism can be either the rejection of theism,[1] or the assertion that deities do not exist.[2] In the broadest sense, it is the absence of belief in the existence of deities.[3]

Source

No, they actually are just saying that they don't believe in a Monotheistic deity that controls everything. And if Atheists cannot make their loss of faith as you call it public, then should Christians make their abundance of faith public? Crude double standard isn't it?

~Keeper

i dont see a problem with this at all, its all about choice imo. you don't like the sound of it don't send your kids there its all very simple really.

activities for campers include a competition to disprove the existence of the mythical unicorn – with the winner receiving a £10 note on which Dawkins, the author of The God Delusion, has signed his name.

Now how is anybody going to be able to disprove the existence of the unicorn? That is just teaching kids bad logic if there is actually to be a "winner".

reply to post by theyreadmymind


Perhaps not disprove, but allow the kids to subjectively look at the topic and question things they've been told to be truth.

I think it's great that they are actually getting kids to prove adults wrong in something or another. It's promoting intelligent debate and deconstruction of false ideals/facts.

~Keeper

I believe Church ( any kind of Church for any religion ) is not perfect and it does many mistake

I am not angry with atheists, I don't say to my friends atheists to believe, they should think deeply and get a personal response

I am sure Atheists are rebels, but there is nothing to rebel against...

I am a faithful person, but I thought deeply so many things, I even went through a period of not believing, but now I'm back and I have a free kind of faith...

I believe that in these decades church is too much conservative, but church is adaptable

I am Catholic, I live in Italy, but I believed for years about reincarnation, than I believed and still strongly believe in parallel universes, so I am very open minded I guess

The Bible is just a part of the street to discover faith...It is not all just in the Book

In my opinion, as a 19 year old guy, faith in the creator should be very personal, but with some respect too

I am not writing this to persuade you to believe, only you know if you should think about it or not

I am not here to teach anything, I edited the post above, so read what I've written and think about...Just this

I believe life is a travelling through many experiences and way of thinking, so I am not conservative neither I am someone who discriminates...I can live with Atheists, this is for sure

To be atheist is not actually bad or even concerning...It's something everyone of us goes through...Only you can decide to come back on your beliefs

I have both a rational side and a spiritual side, when I use both of those way of thinking I get my personal response

If some religious people would decide to discriminate and tell people to avoid atheists I would be against this decision

I just say that I find something which makes me think about my personal faith in everything



[edit on 28-6-2009 by Matteo]

[edit on 28-6-2009 by Matteo]

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
reply to post by theyreadmymind

 

Perhaps not disprove, but allow the kids to subjectively look at the topic and question things they've been told to be truth.

I think it's great that they are actually getting kids to prove adults wrong in something or another. It's promoting intelligent debate and deconstruction of false ideals/facts.

~Keeper

It says disprove. And there's no way they're going to be able to prove adults wrong without misconstruing the facts, which is what I mean by bad logic. You say "deconstruction of false ideas/facts". What exactly are you referring to? Is it a fact that there was never any such thing referred to as a unicorn? Or are you incorporating constructs from various sources so you can then deconstruct these ideas in an effort to discredit the existence of unicorns? If that were the case, you would be teaching these kids to be typical debunkers based on strawman arguments.

I think that too many people are brought to think that they should not believe in anything they don't see when it's told to them as children that Santa does not exist...So, if I will have children, I will not tell them anything about Santa...

Religion is not about magic...Is about getting the way in which a clock works...We all are clocks and nature and universe is a clock...Maths is the thing who makes me think about Creator...Order is in everything...Dna makes me think about Creator...Any news in science maes me think about Creator...
Religion ( Read faith ) is about everything, things we can see and things we cannot see

God is in constant creation of new horizons...We will slowly discover everything we didn't discover in the past

God Delusion should be read as Santa Delusion...Santa is a bad thing because it's a old tale who should not be used to tell children anymore...

Christmas is not about getting something, should be about the good sense of giving something to others...


[edit on 28-6-2009 by Matteo]

I think that children should be exposed to all faiths, including the idea of atheism, and then allowed to make their own choices regarding the subject. My daughter was allowed to make her own choices, and although they do not coincide with mine, I support her right to believe as she wishes in this matter. The problem I see with this camp is that it only endorses atheism, thus making it no better than the Christian Camps mentioned above. Of course, I went to Catholic summer camp, and besides attending Mass every Sunday, it wasn't really religious at all. So if this camp just avoids spiritual (or lack thereof) matters, then it seems perfectly fine.

[edit on 28-6-2009 by JaxonRoberts]

reply to post by theyreadmymind


The Unicorn is irrelevant. It's just a symbol they are using. They could have used Sasquatch. It's the fact that they are teaching them to think critically about things that are told to them, wether far fetched or not.

Any sort of exercise that incorporates these ideals are phenominal for childhood development. Let's not breed more sheep than we already have.

~Keeper

An "Atheist" camp is just as awful as any religious camp. Children believe whatever you tell them. They are very susceptible to any kind of brainwashing. Why not just send them to a REGULAR camp??

My last opinion about this: just think about

Scientists are the people who have the greatest chance to realize the existance of a Creator...Order is something which is created, ad Order is in everything...But they don't seem to get it...

Church structure is not done by divine people, so it is obvious they do some mistakes...

I love the way Mother Teresa lived, she was divine...Every one should learn from her...From her words...You know, even she went through a period of not believing, it's natural...
She understood so many things we cannot imagine...

If Earth would have been Heaven since the beginning there would not be anything to learn...

Earth is a learning place...

Wouldn't an "atheist" summer camp be just like any baseball, soccer, or good old fashioned summer camp that has nothing to do with religion? It's not like religious summer camps have a monopoly in the summer camp market. I worked for two summers while I was in college at a Christian camp. There really was no difference between our camp and other summer camps that I'd been to when I was younger, except during the day, we had about an hour and a half of Bible teaching, some in the morning, some in the evening. In other camps, the Bible teaching would've been replaced with arts and crafts, swimming lessons, or something like that. Why is this a big deal?