What is Reddit's opinion of The God Virus: How Religion Infects Our Lives and Culture?

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

It's a good analogy and the subject of a pretty good book called "The God Virus."

> (First of all i'm a christian so please be nice and respectful)

*sigh* You know, most of us are decent people, right? So unless you come in here bashing on us, I think it's far to say that most of us aren't going to fly off the handle. That said, understand this: We're usually respectful to "people". "Idea's" OTOH are fair game. Meaning don't be shocked if we treat your faith w/ a lot less reverence than you think it deserves.

>alot of media makes atheists look like people that want to make religion illegal,

Hence be wary of what media you watch. ONL, Glen Beck, Todd Starns, Answers in Genesis, etc. are known to take liberties w/ the truth to bend it according to their agenda.

>get offended when people do something as simple as praying in public

Oh! you mean like this? That doesn't happen and this is a perfect example of how the media got it wrong. A MUCH more likely scenario would be some Christians getting offended at Muslims praying before they eat or who says Merry Xmas vs. Happy Holidays. This idea that atheists get raging mad at seeing someone praying had been perpetuated by Christians for as long as I can remember. The plot behind God's Not Dead? It's bullshit. I'm sure that somewhere at some point, some atheist got all offended at seeing someone praying but I highly suspect it's very rare. Hell, at the last Reason Rally, I saw some guy praying just off to the side. Not a single word in anger was uttered to him.

>or want health professionals to declare religion a mental health disorder

I don't think this is true for most of us. Granted, most of us DO think it kinda a mental disorder but a lot of us come from religious backgrounds and thus have an understanding why people believe. A lot of us do in fact think it's a virus though.

> or are not open minded to learning about other religions,

This is one of those things that Christians like to do and that's project their own faults onto others. I can't recall an atheist refusing to learn about other faiths. There's PLENTY of video's, podcasts, etc just so we can be aware of the differences. Hell, the Scathing Atheist went through Lee Strobel's Case For Christ. He's also read the Bible, Book of Mormons, and the Koran. I've read the bible myself end-to-end. It's usually the theists who refuse to learn about other faiths. Plenty of stories out there of parents getting violently upset because their kids were learning about Islam while studying the Mid-East. Or trying to get yogo classes to shut down. Better yet, purposely trying to antagonize and shut down Drag Queen Story Hour. Here's one that got shut down in my area due to the death threats.

Here's a perfect example of Christian hypocrisy. This woman went to interrupt a private drag story hr where no one was forced to attend. Yet, a few months before, she was bitching to the local school board about how it's the PARENTS job to educate about sex and not the school's.

> i don't know any atheist so i want an answer

I commend you for being open, honest and being sincere I hope. It does take courage to reach out of the bubble one lives in. Especially if one is taught to perceive us as enemies. Keep asking questions.

Your JW family are the victims of a Cult mind virus. They are infected like you were. When others look at it this way it can mitigate their anger. .......... https://www.amazon.com/God-Virus-Religion-Infects-Culture-ebook/dp/B0030AOBTI/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=cult+virus&qid=1577799550&sr=8-4 .............http://93.174.95.29/_ads/EDFDD24B827914E204E963C8951C4023

> Firstly because the Bible isn't fictional. There's more than enough historical material to prove it. Secondly (and directly related), the Bible isn't telling fables with a moral; it's telling history. Accounts of what actually happened. This functions to show how God has been active throughout history.

Some of the events in the bible are factual, or have at least a factual basis, but there is no evidence for any kind of miraculous occurrence except that it's in a holy book. For example, I believe Egypt experienced the plagues in the sense that I believe unexplained phenomena occurred, but I do not believe god caused them, and I believe they have a scientific explanation that the people of the time couldn't yet have known.

The bible is a book written by men. Men have agendas. Religion enjoys a protected status all over the world in its various forms, which allows it to do things like operating without paying taxes or cover up horrifying sex scandals. There is no evidence that the bible contains divine inspiration, other than that the bible says so.

> The Book of Job, my friend. The whole book examines the question of why suffering is allowed by God, and there's a ton of different ideas explored within the book. The story of Joseph in Genesis is another good example. Also, I'd like to point out Romans 5: 3-4.

>"...because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the book of Job about a bet between god and satan, wherein god proceeds to torture Job and kill his family just to prove how loyal he'll be? Dude, that's some seriously sadistic stuff. If god is cool with that level of indifference to human suffering he's a bad god who doesn't deserve veneration. He's a kid kicking ant hills.

>It's a basic concept, really: going through tough shit makes you a stronger and potentially better person. It helps you learn from mistakes. Et cetera. The bottom line is that all suffering happens for a reason. Just because we don't know the reason in any given scenario doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. In that context, having a God who is indeed loving but also allows suffering isn't contradictory at all.

I'm going to approach this from a couple of angles. Firstly, I'm curious what the children who die every day across the world from malnutrition and disease learn from their suffering. What does the infant who is born addicted to drugs, who suffers for a day and dies, learn from that experience? The way you describe it makes it sound like a game god is playing. Accrue enough suffering points and you're in! People suffer because the world is random and chaotic. If god has a plan for us, maybe it should involve not getting raped and killed more often.

Secondly, can you see how easily weaponizable your point of view is? Churches have been telling people for generations that their lot in life is to suffer, that you work hard here and have a good afterlife there. Why? So that people would be cool with spending their entire lives suffering for someone else's benefit. So that spending your life in a factory or a cubicle becomes 'noble' and not 'depressing' and 'soul-crushing.'

It is a system designed to discourage critical thought and dissent. It is only very recently that the various christian sects of the world have opened up to being criticized. A few hundred years ago it got you burned as a heretic or worse. Religion operates like a memetic virus in the human brain. It infects our thinking and resists removal, which is why it has persisted since people could speak.

(Real quick - I tried my best not to be disrespectful but I can be an asshole about this stuff so please don't take it personally. I appreciate that you want to have a dialogue.)