Saturday, June 25, 2011

NY: Atheists protest “Heaven” sign honoring 9/11 victims



Atheists making themselves obnoxious again:
A group of New York City atheists is demanding that the city remove a street sign honoring seven firefighters killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks because they say the sign violates the separation of church and state.

The street, “Seven in Heaven Way,” was officially dedicated last weekend in Brooklyn outside the firehouse where the firefighters once served. The ceremony was attended by dozens of firefighters, city leaders and widows of the fallen men.

“There should be no signage or displays of religious nature in the public domain,” said Ken Bronstein, president of New York City Atheists. “It’s really insulting to us.” Bronstein told Fox News Radio that his organization was especially concerned with the use of the word “heaven.” “We’ve concluded as atheists there is no heaven and there’s no hell,” he said.

Source

56 comments:

stan b said...

Apparently, their offense by the presence of religious displays trumps our offense by the lack of religious displays. This is a silly game, ain't it?

Joey said...

“We’ve concluded as atheists there is no heaven and there’s no hell,” he said.

He is saying that they are offended by something that does not exist.

Anonymous said...

His faith in his lack of faith is so weak that he is afraid that a little sign will cause him to lose his lack of faith .

Anonymous said...

I do not want MY tax dollars to go to these religious displays.

Anonymous said...

Responding to Anon 1:19,

I'm sure you do not want your tax dollars to go to maintaining the military cemeteries either. You know, the one's with row upon row of white crosses. We can't cross that, non existent, line separating church and state, right?

Anonymous said...

Anon153,

Absolutely. Also, tax the churches like the big businesses they are.

Anonymous said...

I really feel sorry for these people's kids. Can you imagine never taking their kids to Disneyland. I mean, it is the center of offensive - I have concluded there is no Peter Pan, Mickey Mouse, Cinderelle, etc. and there they are all openly displayed! How incredibly offensive!

Thomas Moss said...

Imagine if the government decided to name this street the "seven in Allah's paradise" or "seven to be reincarnated on a higher plane" or "seven who have shed their thetans" street. You would probably be extremely upset about this, and rightly so - as was quoted in the original post “There should be no signage or displays of religious nature in the public domain”. Why is it no big deal when the government implicitly supports Christianity by making such a display, when it would be unacceptable for the government to support any other religion in the same way?

sig said...

What about "Church Street"? Are they going to force neighborhoods to change those as well?

Anonymous said...

Silly sentimental sign (not worthy of the victims).

Anonymous said...

Sig,

What about this? What about that? Stop playing your childish games.

Anonymous said...

If there is a church in Church Street then it's materially factual. Heaven is not.

Anonymous said...

Just like there is probably a market on Market Street.

Anonymous said...

OH NO!! What are we to do if there is noone named Fairmont living on Fairmont St, or no cherry trees on Cherry St. We're going to have to rename most of the streets!!

stinky said...

No heaven and no hell?

But history tells us that officially atheistic countries - e.g. under Stalin, Mao etc - were living hells, slaughtering their own peoples by the tens of millions, a pace several orders of magnitude worse than before.

Perhaps another street name could reflect that in the future. Atheistic Genocide Avenue, anyone? It would be both secular and accurate.

Anonymous said...

Yeah it's okay to call streets after any object or any fantacy figure. Why not Santa Steet, or Easter Bunny Street. It would be just as silly as Heaven Street or Way. How about Silly Way.

Dean said...

“It’s really insulting to us.”

Isn't that the name of the game? Find something by which to be insulted or offended and then complain loudly?

“We’ve concluded as atheists there is no heaven and there’s no hell,”

They're in for quite a surprise.

Anonymous said...

A good place for good family values republicans to hang out would be Whore St.

Anonymous said...

Howabout Christian Cruscade Street, or Inquisition Avenue or Witch Burning Alley?

Anonymous said...

"Isn't that the name of the game? Find something by which to be insulted or offended and then complain loudly?"

Isn't that what you are doing? LOL

Anonymous said...

4:33 AM must have had an after-death experience to know for a fact who is in for a surprise. More likely it will be 4:33.

Kevin said...

So if mentioning anything religious is supporting Christianity thus violating separation of church and state. Which there is no mention of in the constitution. Then forbidding the mentioning of God or anything religious is in effect establishing Atheism as the national religion thus in direct violation of the constitution.

Anonymous said...

anon456:

Pretzel Logic Alert!!!!!

Kevin said...

So any mention of God or anything religious violates the separation of church and state which doesn't appear in the constitution. Then I guess forbidding the mention of God or anything religious establishes Atheism as the official religion which IS in direct violation of the constitution.So any mention of God or anything religious violates the separation of church and state which doesn't appear in the constitution. Then I guess forbidding the mention of God or anything religious establishes Atheism as the official religion which IS in direct violation of the constitution.

Anonymous said...

"Then I guess..."

You guess WRONG!!!

Brian from Rochester said...

OK, people, enough is enough!

The establishment clause ONLY says that the government shall not force people to adhere to a faith, as in the Church of England.

It further states that government will not suppress anyone's right to express their religion openly.

There is nothing in the constitution that protects one from being offended.

This sign does not establish a religion, and the atheist protest does seek to suppress the religious expressions of citizens of this United States.

Can it be any clearer?

Anonymous said...

"the atheist protest does seek to suppress the religious expressions of citizens of this United States."

WRONG!! The protest seeks to suppress the religious expressions of the GOVERNMENT of this United State.

Now, can that be any clearer?

stinky said...

“We’ve concluded as atheists there is no heaven and there’s no hell,”

Circular logic alert! If you're atheists - drawing your conclusion "as atheists" - then no other conclusion is possible other than the atheistic one.

In contrast, an open-minded approach would be to conclude there is no God and therefore become an atheist because of that.

FWIW, either position is too insistently certain for my tastes on a matter for which no unchallengeable proof can be demonstrated, on either the existence of, or nature of - two separate lines of inquiry, surely - God.

========

Kevin defines non-religion as religion? Why not define black as white and say 0 = 1?

Uh, no, you're reasoning from a conclusion there, fella, and making elementary logic errors in doing so.

Kev's analogy - watch the analogues/parallels closely here, this ain't three-card monty - is that zero is a number, which was once a hot mathematical topic, actually, now long since settled; it is. Full faith (f=1) is a faith, and zero faith (f=0) is too, just as 1 is a number and so is 0.

Now try a simple bonus zen q, grasshopper, just for you: does religion corrupt politics, or does politics corrupt religion? (Hint, begin w/a definition of each)

Anonymous said...

Stinky,

Nice remarks. However, when you have scientific proof of the existence of God, give me a jingle.

Anonymous said...

Is St Richards one of the seven on the way to Heaven?

Anonymous said...

"does religion corrupt politics, or does politics corrupt religion?"

One is the whore and the other is the john.

Anonymous said...

Anon7:28. In this country the people are the government.

Anonymous said...

Off topic, but great story, Chicago's top cop says that accessability of guns in the US is an extension of of racism.

http://www.wlsam.com/Article.asp?id=2221691&spid=

Use the Name, Luke said...

Stinky,

Nice remarks. However, when you have scientific proof of the existence of God, give me a jingle.


Stinky, don't bother wasting your time. I've tried to point these guys to evidence for a long time. They ignore it and almost immediately repeat their claim that there's no evidence. Whatever is keeping them from God is clearly not the evidence, or the supposed lack thereof.

stinky said...

And when he has proof of God's non-existence, he can give me a jingle, too. He can explain what came before the big bang, for example.

Because if he can't, he can't be an honest atheist. He could still be an honest agnostic, a doubter whose mind is not made up either way, just not an atheist.

stinky said...

P.S.

Where the heart leads, the head will follow: ie, his deliberately flippant dismissals stem from an emotional disconnect with his fellow human beings, not from a lack of proofs of any kind.

More proofs mean nothing; he needs meaning and purpose in his life and has not yet realized the egotism is only making thing worse for him not better ... tho I suspect he suspects it; most such people do.

stinky said...

One is the whore and the other is the john.

Ah, the standard "I'm above all others" response! How lovely for you. And to retain your adolescent angst so long ... marvelous!

Now, got any grown-up answers? One day you'll seek them, why not now?

Anonymous said...

There's evidence and there's evidence. Evidence can be good, poor or imagined. Religious evidence is imagined as mostly wishful thinking and interpretation to fit the religious mindset. Some atheists may do the equivalent, but most "atheists" are actually agnostics or skeptics, and just interested in what is real or objective as far as humans are able to get it.

What happened before the so-called Big Bang is unknown and is no proof of God, unless you are defining God in the loosest terms.

Anonymous said...

Stinky wrote 'And when he has proof of God's non-existence, he can give me a jingle, too. He can explain what came before the big bang, for example.'

The other side of the coin is equally valid. What was there before God if he created the universe? Where did he come from? To say that he always was and always will be is as simplistic as denying the big bang theory.

I would suggest that at least the big bang theory was developed by scientists but given the current state of science and its relationship to politics re AGW/MMCC I would place science today at about the level of religion just after the dark ages. Both being unable to accomodate criticism without lashing out at those who doubt, btw I am agnostic.

Getting back on topic, what does it matter if the street sign uses the word heaven? Who is that thin skinned that they refuse to acknowledge the sacrifice made by those firefighters in a way that would be acceptable to the families and friends who have been left bereft at thier loss. To object is to demean their worth over the most trivial matters.

If only you idiots in the US could devote as much energy to getting your country back on its feet as you trying to tear it apart.

-btm, Australia

Anonymous said...

"I've tried to point these guys to evidence for a long time. "

Your evidence for the existence of god is nothing but garbage, junk. Your evidence is less valid than that of global warming. Your disdain of science is truly amazing. Your evidence is nothing but bible quotes, quotes of long dead people, and irrelevant history. Nothing of substance to convince me. I have more evidence that the easter bunny, the tooth fairly and santa claus exist than I do of an invisible man in the sky who allows good people to die of agonizing disease because "he loves them" . I have more respect and connection to other human beings in my little finger than you will ever will in your whole being.

Use the Name, Luke said...

Your evidence for the existence of god is nothing but garbage, junk.

See what I mean, Stinky?

Use the Name, Luke said...

What was there before God if he created the universe? Where did he come from?

Einstein figured out that time and space are interrelated. Without space, there is no time.

In other words, before the creation of the universe, time did not exist. Anything outside of the universe exists in a state where there is no time. In that state, there is no such thing as "before" or "after", there is only "is".

Asking what existed "before" something which exists in a timeless state is about as meaningless as asking "Where does a circle begin?"

Anonymous said...

"Where does a circle begin?"

Wherever the pen is first placed.

Anonymous said...

"In this country the people are the government.'

The rich and the corporations are the government. If you think that your vote counts for anything, I have some real estate on the moon to sell you.

Anonymous said...

"See what I mean, Stinky?"

Yes, we all see what your mean. You provide nothing, zilch, nada.

Use the Name, Luke said...

Yes, we all see what your mean. You provide nothing, zilch, nada.

Aaand the tactic is complete. Thanks for proving my point for me.

Anonymous said...

Luke is all for the blanket statements as though he knows what is outside our Universe. Time may well exist in some other dimension or is just how we perceive our existence passing through the 3rd dimension, where time is considered the 4th dimension. Luke thinks that if there is anything outside our known 3D Universe (which is expanding relative to "time") then that somehow proves his Christian version of an anthropomorphic god must exist. Non-sequitur!!

Spurwing Plover said...

Maybe someone should demand the removal of the statue of CHE from CENTRAL PARK and dumping it into the middle of the ATLANTIC OCEAN

stinky said...

Just for fun, consider that if matter can be neither created nor destoryed, then it had to have come here from outside our universe.

And if life here is self-organizing, as Dawkins and others insist (and I'd agree w/that part, too), then it may well have been self-organizing itself for an eternity before our own universe was created.

Possible? Yes. Probable? A matter of opinion. But it's just an off-the-curr arg to make broader pt: to be insistently certain to the pt of insulting and censoring others - as many atheists do today, exactly as religious dictatorships of the past did - is to demand a false certainty.

Embrace the ambiguity, guys ... and be humble, cuz none of us really know the answers.

Use the Name, Luke said...

"The conclusion of this lecture is that the universe has not existed forever. Rather, the universe, and time itself, had a beginning in the Big Bang, about 15 billion years ago."
—Stephen Hawking

http://bit.ly/l6EpYO

stinky said...

"The conclusion of this lecture is that the universe has not existed forever. Rather, the universe, and time itself, had a beginning in the Big Bang, about 15 billion years ago."

I agree, at least as far as the universe as we know it goes. But if matter/energy can be neither created nor destroyed - as bedrock a principle of physics as the big bang itself - then where did that matter/energy come from?

It couldn't have come from inside our universe, since our universe hadn't been created yet. So it had to have come from outside our universe, right?

Use the Name, Luke said...

It couldn't have come from inside our universe, since our universe hadn't been created yet. So it had to have come from outside our universe, right?

Exactly. It had to have been caused to come into existence by something outside of the universe.

Note that the universe coming into existence by itself does not show that an intelligence (god) caused the universe to come into existence, merely that there was a cause, and that it is not made of the same "stuff" as the universe. The nature of this cause (god or chance) requires looking at additional evidence.

Anonymous said...

Slipping in "(god or chance)" is so typically devious of Luke. Only giving the two alternatives, knowing that "chance" is a loaded term suggesting some irrationality or chaos in cosmic origins, when "cause and effect" are what seem to apply, and then Luke will posit "God" as the only alternative and ultimate cause, and then go on to make the huge leap to speciously argue that this "God" must be the God of the Hebrew Bible.

Use the Name, Luke said...

It seems that there are only two known types of causes: an intelligent agent and determinism (what I mean by "chance"). Everything about science seems to rely on these two possible causes. Are you saying there's another option? What is it?

Anonymous said...

You have now changed one of your two options from "chance" which sounds chaotic and undetermined to "determinism" which does follow "cause and effect". But what causes the causes is not necessarily intelligent (implying conscious intelligence such as a "god"); and then you have the problem of infinite regress as regards what caused the cause (or caused god). I suppose you would have to argue for some kind of loop cause, like someone going back in a time-machine to show his younger self how to invent the time-machine.

Jub jub Bird said...

Leftists are afraid that when such things as heaven is mentioned theyll end up in that place far below where they can meet a certian gentleman with horns and a pitchfork