The 5 Most Awful Atheists

[The_Squid]

But that doesn't answer the question, at all.

It is a fairly simple question that gets to the very heart of the matter with respect to this guy and his complaint...

[Smallc]

I refuse to be diverted by what you all would rather talk about.

It's a very simple question, and you may not know it, but you're answering it with every post. You think he's wrong.

[msj]

That's as far as I've read and I won't be reading any more. Adios, amigo.

Um, sure, ok.

So you can call the rest of us below 5th grade educated but for you you won't directly and clearly answer kimmy's question because...?

Edited September 4, 2012 by msj

[Guest American Woman]

It is a fairly simple question that gets to the very heart of the matter with respect to this guy and his complaint...

It doesn't get to the heart of his over-reaction. His extreme emotional distress. His loss of joy in life. His feelings of rejection.

[Smallc]

It doesn't get to the heart of his over-reaction.

But is it really, truly, an over-reaction? The council is not following the law. He's going to make a scene out of it to ensure they do.

[Guest American Woman]

But is it really, truly, an over-reaction?

You tell me. Do you think it would cause him all the emotional distress he's claiming to have suffered? Do you think an occasional recitation of the Lord's Prayer would result in loss of joy in life?

The council is not following the law. He's going to make a scene out of it to ensure they do.

And why couldn't he do that without making a scene? One can't quietly file a lawsuit in Canada? One must first make a scene - which then has an impact on the outcome of the lawsuit? Is that how things work in the court system in Ontario? The "illegal grounds" aren't enough?

[The_Squid]

It doesn't get to the heart of his over-reaction. His extreme emotional distress. His loss of joy in life. His feelings of rejection.

You obviously do not understand why these buzzwords are used in lawsuits.

Let me try and explain....

The law says that you must have suffered "severe or extreme emotional distress" from the actions of the defendant. Hence, if the lawsuit includes emotional distress, the lawyer MUST use these words in describing the actions otherwise there is no lawsuit. A judge will be the ultimate arbiter of whether this was actually true or not....

The same goes for the other buzzwords used in the lawsuit.

So these buzzwords are not a reflection of an overreaction by the plaintiff, but simply the terms used when one files a lawsuit.

Does that help?

[msj]

Well said, The Squid.

I also note from the National Post article:

Both Mr. Ferguson and the Peterborough plaintiffs made several appeals to their respective councils before learning of Secular Ontario’s cause and seeking Mr. Mayo’s counsel.

IOW, he asked council to follow the law in the first place and they decided to continue to break the law.

So, next step is to file a lawsuit which requires the buzzwords [most likely recommended by the lawyer Daniel Mayo], as quoted from the article:

anguish, discrimination, exclusion, rejection and loss of enjoyment of life.

So far so good.

As to his tone?

I have no idea.

Somehow I suspect AW thinks he is screaming like a banshee about his anguish and rejection.

I, on the other hand, focus on what he was actually quoted as saying in that article, which is:

I don’t like politicians who break the law, and our county council is breaking the law,

and

I don’t really care about religion that much, I care about the law. I care about being fair.

This sounds reasonable to me.

As for the overreaction?

Well, this part of the article can't be discussed here because presumably it isn't "awful atheists" who are doing the hate mail:

Mr. Ferguson said he already had received hateful emails on Tuesday, a day after the lawsuit went public

No, probably should create an Awful Christian thread for this one.

Thanks for pointing this out to us, AW.

[Guest American Woman]

You obviously do not understand why these buzzwords are used in lawsuits.

Let me try and explain....

The law says that you must have suffered "severe or extreme emotional distress" from the actions of the defendant. Hence, if the lawsuit includes emotional distress, the lawyer MUST use these words in describing the actions otherwise there is no lawsuit. A judge will be the ultimate arbiter of whether this was actually true or not....

The same goes for the other buzzwords used in the lawsuit.

So these buzzwords are not a reflection of an overreaction by the plaintiff, but simply the terms used when one files a lawsuit.

Does that help?

Not really; it doesn't clearly answer my question regarding lawsuits in general. Can't one file a lawsuit in Ontario based on the fact that an activity is illegal? Can people continually engage in illegal activities in Ontario as long as it's not causing anyone emotional distress?

[The_Squid]

Not really; it doesn't clearly answer my question regarding lawsuits in general. Can't one file a lawsuit in Ontario based on the fact that an activity is illegal? Can people continually engage in illegal activities in Ontario as long as it's not causing anyone emotional distress?

First off, that wasn't the question I was trying to answer. You asked about severe emotional distress and I told you why the lawsuit would be worded in that way.

Your other questions I would have to provide some conjecture to answer:

I doubt that any cops are looking at enforcing court orders in regards to religion in city councils, so then there has to be a different way in which this is enforced. I suspect that either the Province or the Feds could tell the city councils that they must stop this activity, but they haven't obviously.

I suppose the way a private citizen would put a stop to this would be to bring forward, and win, a lawsuit.

[Guest American Woman]

First off, that wasn't the question I was trying to answer. You asked about severe emotional distress and I told you why the lawsuit would be worded in that way.

I asked about why he would have to claim severe emotional distress in order to file a lawsuit, why he couldn't have simply filed the lawsuit of the grounds that it's illegal; why the basis of the lawsuit couldn't have been that it's in violation of his charter rights.

I doubt that any cops are looking at enforcing court orders in regards to religion in city councils, so then there has to be a different way in which this is enforced. I suspect that either the Province or the Feds could tell the city councils that they must stop this activity, but they haven't obviously.

So my question remains - why couldn't the lawsuit have been filed solely on the grounds the practice is illegal?

I suppose the way a private citizen would put a stop to this would be to bring forward, and win, a lawsuit.

And I'm wondering why that lawsuit would have to involve emotional distress; why it couldn't have been filed on the grounds of the illegality of it. I would need proof that it couldn't have been filed on the grounds that it's violating his rights because it's illegal. It's the severe emotional distress aspect of it that I am taking issue with.

[msj]

Canada doesn't have the advantage of suing based on the first amendment so we do things differently to achieve the same result.

Oh, and to bring this back on-topic - I don't think the two American's in that link above are "overreacting" either.

Nor are they "awful atheists."

[cybercoma]

Again, I've already addressed it. And again, I'm not going to be diverted to yet another discussion about Christians. This is about him, and his over-reaction - not about the issue of prayers at the council meetings - and as long as you all refuse to have anything to say about that, as you're all too eager to talk about Christians over-reacting, I refuse to be diverted by what you all would rather talk about.

How do you talk about him and his over-reaction to prayers at the council meetings without talking about prayers at the council meetings, hm?

[cybercoma]

You obviously do not understand why these buzzwords are used in lawsuits.

Let me try and explain....

The law says that you must have suffered "severe or extreme emotional distress" from the actions of the defendant. Hence, if the lawsuit includes emotional distress, the lawyer MUST use these words in describing the actions otherwise there is no lawsuit. A judge will be the ultimate arbiter of whether this was actually true or not....

The same goes for the other buzzwords used in the lawsuit.

So these buzzwords are not a reflection of an overreaction by the plaintiff, but simply the terms used when one files a lawsuit.

Does that help?

Wow! You're good. I didn't even realize that she didn't understand that. I guess I should stop giving people the benefit of the doubt.

[dre]

oh boy

[bleeding heart]

I wonder how a Christian might react if some council member insisted that each council meeting should open with a couple of minutes of native dancing, chanting, and drumming, to invoke the Great Spirit. As an atheist, I see both as an equally stupid waste of time. What about you guys? If there's 2 minutes of prayer for Jesus, what about another 2 minutes of native drumming? Seems fair, doesn't it?

-k

Well...let's say 30 seconds each, instead.

Edited September 7, 2012 by bleeding heart

[bleeding heart]

In our society one sometimes needs to go to court and has to raise attention for their principles.

If/when the town council follows the law and stops the prayers then I would expect him to drop the lawsuit.

If/when he doesn't drop it and/or if/when he wins the $5,000 and does not donate it then I will put him in some kind of top 10,000 of awful atheists list.

[Guest American Woman]

[bleeding heart]

I don't know much about Sam Harris, but I don't think characterizing him as an anti-Islam zealot is accurate. His point is not that "the terrorists are going to get us". His point, as I understand it, is that Islam is a terrible religion full of terrible ideas and that it has been afforded a respect it does not deserve because being critical of religion has been deemed inappropriate. Harris recently got in trouble with the Political Correctness Police when he argued in favor of racial profiling at airports. His argument is that refusing to consider race and religion as criteria in screening is a triumph of political correctness over rationality and observable empirical evidence. Considering the number of recent "angry white dude" terrorist incidents, perhaps his empirical evidence needs updating and his argument can be challenged on those grounds. However, characterizing it as Islamophobia falls short.

I have some sympathy for this view, but I think the author's take here was from a slightly different direction.

Harris' views on Islam (with which I don't entirely disagree, incidentally) seem to be married both to his views on torture...and (directly related) his views on the "War on Terror," in which Enlightened States flit about trying to fight evil, and so their actions must be given, relatively, something of a pass from principled objections.

The problem (or one of the problems) here is that Harris, much like the late Hitchens, certainly know better than this; at any rate, they have not renounced their respective reams of opinion and analysis on exactly these subjects...which suddenly became...inconvenient to them...after 9/11, once they got excited about black and white Wars Against Evil.

[edit] I should add that I don't know enough of Harris to even state that these arguments against him are accurate (as I believe they are for Hitchens, more or less); only that I think this is the criticism of him here.

Edited September 9, 2012 by bleeding heart