This Will Get Your Blood Going…

likewise, there are plenty of Christians who are dorks/nerds/losers/etc.

Someone should remind this guy, the Jesus he follows is described as “no form nor comeliness”-“no beauty that we should desire him”-“despised and rejected of men”, and “as one from whom men hide their face, he was despised and we esteemed him not” (Isaiah 53)

I’m so confused. I graduated from high school with A’s and B’s, and I have a 4.0 GPA in grad school. I play the guitar (not well, but hey), I’ve never used illegal drugs, and I like swimming, snorkeling and ice skating. Nor am I overweight. The whole atheist decision was a series of events which were finally clarified within me a few years ago. However, I have been known to whine.

But I don’t *want* to get laid! I’m celibate by choice.

I haven’t used drugs. I’m not overweight. I’m far less whiney [sic] than most of the Christians I know, nor do I think I am “sketchy” (whatever he means by that). I was one of the top scorers on my Ultimate Frisbee team in college, as well as being the MVP of my Cross Country team in high school. I got all A’s and B’s in high school and a 4.0 in college. I played a lot of “dorky” instruments like tuba in high school, but currently play more than 20 different instruments including electric and acoustic guitar. I have been told by female friends that I’m a “chick magnet.”

In fact, I was a pretty big loser until the last year or so of high school… and I was a Christian then. It wasn’t till I stopped being a loser that I started losing my Christianity. Once I was confident and comfortable with myself, then I could start questioning my beliefs.

So I’m pretty much the opposite of what this guy describes, I guess.

He’s right. I never got boys in high school, didn’t lose the V-card til college. But, I think that is because I was a born again fundie all though high school with a lot TLW bling. Crazy as this sounds, the few dates I did have were kind of unromantic due to all of the Jesus talk.

Hey – tubas are cool.

I am amused that he doesn’t talk about Christopher Hitchen’s drinking, but rather seems to think he doesn’t have a job. He does have a job- he’s a writer. That’s why we know about him- he writes things, not just about atheism.

Also, I bet the only reason he only met loser atheists is because cool atheists wouldn’t be seen dead with him.

As for me- yes, its true that I am not a sports star. But I did very well in school and I have never used drugs (though I am not exactly against them, either- I tend to think your business is your damn business, mostly).

wow… i played tuba TOO!!! Just. Makes. Sense. is all i need. I don’t subscribe to beliefs that don’t make sense, or don’t seem REAL. Simple… right?

I shall forever love the Euphonium, coolness or lack thereof notwithstanding.

I suppose that I am something of a loser – but, then again, once a person takes the conceit that all atheists are losers, they’ll start to look for loserly qualities in every atheist they meet. Humans being what we are, it’s not hard to find some little social “flaw” in anyone you’re trying to find one in.

Well, yes, I was the typical uncool nerd in school: overweight, bad at sports, friendless (which didn’t matter that much to me at that time), occasionally unhappy (aren’t we all), book-obsessed, played the piano (not even in school orchestra, just because I liked it), and I participated in various (computer) science competitions (again: just because I wanted to, not because it was some form of class- or school activity). I got good grades though, often without bothering to study at all. But I think it didn’t cause my atheism. What however might be true is that the nerds, who do not care what others think about them have less issues figuring out for themselves whether they believe or not.

It gets worse if you turn the ‘argument’ around, that you need to belong to a certain social group, so to say, to keep your faith. It would show that religion is far more a social concept than an intellectual one.

I think this is a matter of post-factual causality, because it wasn’t that all the atheists were the social outsiders for whatever reason, but that the social outcasts, every school’s “geeks”, usually had the HIGHEST GPA, and probably paid more attention in science class, and actually got their mind working on other things to have even discovered atheism anyway.

The real argument he’s presenting is that Christianity is natural and produces healthy individuals. But of course, when Christian morality in a general sense defines the norm, anyone who disagrees will find themselves in conflict at some point, thus appearing “not normal”. Strange. Other. Especially when “whiney” is on his list of things that are strange.
Shit, I used to work reception in a welfare office. Whiney is perfectly normal for a large part of the population, I’ve seen bullshit entitlement attitudes from every ethnicity and a lot of religions, natural citizens and immigrants. Seriously, I’ve been called racist by a Russian immigrant who believed we were favoring Hispanic people because we ran out of the English version of a form; they only saw the Spanish form and assumed we weren’t putting in effort for the English speakers, and bitched about it.
Clearly this guy’s just looking for anything to support his “unnatural” theory.

Hrmm… steady girlfriend for five years now, graduated from college with honors in digital systems technology, always hated sports, and I don’t do traditional instruments, I prefer Fruity Loops and Reason.

David W, your comment is great.

Has this person looked around their own church? I bet you’ll find a few fat friendless tuba players there, too.

And I’d dispute the notion that atheists didn’t get good grades in school. I graduated summa cum laude and I think academic achievement would be the norm.

Why did I get a sense of déjà vu while reading that? I swear I’ve read that exact same rant somewhere else. Maybe it was just one really similar. Similarly lame.

This is the classic case of confirmation bias. He wants to think that atheists on average are abnormal in some way or another. And so he sees what he wants to see. When he encounters an atheist, he searches their entire character until he finds a single “abnormal” aspect, and then he forgets about all the normal things. I mean, just look at all the different things that qualify as abnormal to him. He would see the same thing in everybody else too, only he doesn’t want to.

I’ll have to get back to you after I finish eating this baby.

Obviously, this person has no idea what they’re talking about. For example, I was getting ass left and right after I dropped religion from my life. Pardon the crudeness, but Jesus is the ultimate cock blocker.

Vjack, RFLOL.

I’m impressed with the bios here.

I object to generalizations and stereotypes. Has there ever been a fatherless loser that in his or her anger rejected every social expectation, including religion? Sure. But, as this blog shows, there have been very fortunate, successful, well-adjusted ‘winners’ that were free to choose what they wanted to believe or not, and, for many different reasons, chose not to believe in God.

I doubt the author is serious about his argument; he’s likely just trying to derogate atheists and convince himself that Christians are not losers. Fear is the motivator that I have found often explains the desperate deeds of Christians. But, I should be cautious here lest I generalize or stereotype.

People, don’t even bother to counter this argument. It’s faulty logic to the core. It’s a patently ridiculous statement and should just be trounced. No one has to justify ANYTHING to this arrogant loser.

After all, I have NEVER heard of a Christian doing such things as lying, sodomizing children, hoarding child porn, using prostitutes, doing drugs, embezzling church funds, being a closeted homosexual (or not) [Note: for the record, this stance is simply to counter the typical Christian stance. I view homosexuality as completely normal], a closet sodomizer (and lying about it on national news), being a divorcee, or ANYTHING like that, oh noooo. Never.

P.S. RIGHT ON, VJACK! 🙂

I was a tuba player, too! Now I’m thinking of starting a new group in Atheist Nexus – Tuba Playing Atheists!

I was high in my class rankings in high school, played basketball and football (although not very well.) I played trombone, bass and acoustic guitar and had a pretty good social groups of friends. But all that was when I was a Christian. It was only later that I became an atheist loser.

But what’s all this about Christians getting laid more? Aren’t they supposed to be saving themselves?

News just in, Christian moron has a blog, writes moronic posts. Some of it is comedy gold: atheists don’t play cool instruments or get girls and those people don’t take drugs, atheists don’t get good grades but they keep over representing at higher education levels.

This person bizarrely thinks Dawkins’s tone is bitter and angry, may not realise that Richard is British thus has a pretty standard British accent and manner. Also, there’s nothing wrong or unusual about divorcing twice in a lifetime.

They’re right about one thing though, being an occasional columnist isn’t a real job. Yet anyone who sees a problem with not working much while earning quite a bit, has demonstrated a kind of stupidity not easily equalled.

Sorry, but I have to call Poe’s Law on this idiocy; if serious, this anti-atheist rant is fractally wrong.

And I’d love to “not really have a job” like Christopher Hitchens…except for the prodigious Scotch intake, anyway…

Of course, we can all agree that not all atheists are like this…

But at the same time, I have seen atheist student groups and D&D student groups with very similar membership…

The worst part of that quote, in my mind, is how it others any person who is overweight, has used drugs, etc. etc. We’re not normal, despite the fact that statistically, overweight Americans and drug users are in the majority.

The description of atheists is meant to be offensive, but I’m not offended at all – just puzzled at the dismissive tone.

I hope someday to find this shit, run him over a bit in my Porche, get out of the car and assault him repeatedly with my skateboard, pausing only long enough to share some of raunchy stories spent wasting my youth drinking and fornicating on Bondi Beach. What a sanctimonious prick.

Well, this person nailed me. I am a pathetic loser. But so what: my being a loser doesn’t make theism make sense. 🙂

Ok, I am not overweight now but I was as recently as 1993. Getting a PhD in mathematics does firmly put one in the nerd category. I share an undergraduate Alma mater with John McCain though I did a bit better academically that he did. 🙂

And no professional women’s beach volleyball player ever asked me to pat her backside (as Misty May just did with President Bush).

Athletically, I was never offered a shoe contract; every time I finished a marathon (or longer) the winner had long since finished an departed.

I’m glad I’m not an Atheist, just an atheist.

Yeah, I stopped worrying about who thinks I’m cool about 20 years ago.

I vaguely recall that being important to children and very young adults.

Ha ha ha! I’m a little surprised you gave this kid so many pixels for his trolling. But if I can recall back that far, I did score goals (in soccer, although bicycling was my sport) and went to both proms.
To be fair though, I could imagine if the author was in parochial school the only exposure s/he would have to an agnostic/atheistic viewpoint would be either from the more creative thinkers or the teens who are acting out. That might fit with their description.

Whatever the case, I’ve never known an Atheist I could exactly qualify as “normal.”

Who the hell wants to be normal? Besides, if you look closely enough at anyone, you’ll be able to find something weird about them. It’s easy to unconsciously link them together if you know who the atheists are already.

Here is an atheist, raised Catholic.

Top 3 in class at elementary and high school, high performance scholarship the last 7 years of education prior to entering into Grad school.

I have a beautiful girlfriend, tons of female friends. I love travel, walking, mountain-trekking, know how the basics of playing music with a flute, find my way in a map, I talk and write in two languages, do haikus and short stories in one of them. I have had under my command 20+ people at a job.
I am kind of geek/nerd (whatever you use for someone who does have social skills – it’s a known fact depending where are you from one of these has a non-pejorative sense), but after all: there is the saying that a geek is the one you pick at school and end up working for.

I have run 3 marathons.
I play 5 instruments.
I weigh 160.
I have never done drugs.
I have a 3.6 GPA and I’m going to grad school.
I’m single by choice (see above “going to”)
I have 574 known friends on Facebook.
By no means am I bragging on any of those, but I’m just saying the dude isn’t right on a single one…

Never used drugs. Played trombone instead of guitar. Ivy league grad, have 3 degrees, was a varsity fencer in college, and now am a lawyer.
Wife (1st and only, 11 years running) went ivy league and MIT and is an engineer.
We’re both atheists. Most of our friends are agnostic or atheist and in happy families.

Oh, both of our extended families are Catholics. Go figure.

Am I the only one who is deeply disturbed by the inordinate number of tuba players commenting on this site? Clearly the tuba is an instrument of the devil as it fosters atheism to an unheard-of degree. 🙂
Congratulations to those commentors who are “celibate by choice”. I could never get the hang of that (oh, I’ve been celibate plenty of times, just never by choice).
Thankfully, like most human beings I don’t fit into any stereotypes atheist or otherwise. I was (sigh) an athlete once upon a time but my sport was fencing which may not be 100% cool.
I did end up as a dad and my daughter’s mom was a model at one time.
I have a job too, but I’ll never be rich.
Aside from my atheism I’m really not that different from any Christian I’ve ever met – since here in Canada we tend to have more of the “religion lite” folks and not a lot of fundamentalists.

A lot of Christians are either unable or unwilling to grasp the concept that there are people who have looked at Christianity and rejected it as false. Christians want or need to think that people become atheists due to some problems.

Which is incredibly ironic. Jesus spent time with social outcasts, and now it is the Christians in the USA who do the condemning and rejecting.

I think I’m a normal girl. I’m attractive. Never had a problem with the guys. I made decent grades in HS and college. (However, I did play percussion in HS band.) I didn’t have any traumatic events happen in my life… I just really like science and logic. I would post a picture of my non-nerdy/freakish self for all to see, but I’m still a closet atheist. 🙂

I notice that “One Christian”, who wrote this post, seems to have stopped approving posts. My response to him has been sitting awaiting moderation for two days.

Here’s what I wrote:

Some people have composed thoughtful responses to your unthoughtful post. You have ignored their thoughtful points and calls for elevating the discussion, dswerling, and responded only with snark.

This was after his smug response to all the reactions:

Fascinating

It seems that the best way to get a response from people is to insult them. The same way writing a book called “The God Delusion” will result in tremendous notoriety and popularity for its offensive message, writing a blog entry about how all atheists are losers also yields massive response. I had never realized what a brilliant bussinessman Richard Dawkins must be.

He’s not interested in dialog. Just another troll.