Fundie Logic, Aggression and Mindset (FLAM)

[Zero]

2. Even though reason and faith seem to have an inverse relationship, how are 'Jesus died for you' and 'Don't you want to go to heaven' arguments in their minds?

(1)Jesus died for you, the Bible says so.
(2)As far as they're concerned Heaven and Hell exist. People who believe in God will go to Heaven, those who don't will go to Hell. Arguing off these postulates you're being a big humanitarian by trying to convert people.

The danger in these beliefs is that if you truly believe in them, hell is an eternal place of torture and punishment, and any amount of torture on earth is justified to keep you from going there...

[wolveraptor]

How do they respond to the question, "How do you know?"

[The Spartan]

How do they respond to the question, "How do you know?"

The most common answer I've encountered would be something to the effect of, "I have felt his prescence," or "I can feel the holy ghost." Sometimes I've heard people claim to have heard god's voice.

[Darth Wong]

How do they respond to the question, "How do you know?"

The most common answer I've encountered would be something to the effect of, "I have felt his prescence," or "I can feel the holy ghost." Sometimes I've heard people claim to have heard god's voice.

A lot of them point to medical misdiagnoses or medical patients "beating the odds" and try to use that as proof of miracles. One of the most insufferable fundies I ever met worked in a hospital and said "I see miracles every week, praise Jesus." The fact that such things are apparently commonplace would suggest to me that they're not miracles, but that's obviously not the way this guy thinks.

[The Spartan]

The most ridiculous one I heard was that a fundy's house burned to the ground and the only thing that survived was his Bible, soaked with water from the Firefighters. After some drying time in the oven(IIRC) the Bible was all better. It's a miracle! [Dr.Evil]...rrriiiggghhhttt...[/DE]

House burnt down?
Check.
All possessions lost?
Check.
Bible saved?
Check.
Conclusion?
Miracle!


No I shit you not. This was used as an example as how great god is when I was in a Christian Elementary school. Worse yet, I bought it, because at the time I was totally indoctrinated. And about 10 as I recall.

[Darth Wong]

My favourite miracle testimony was the woman who lost her sunglasses on the beach. She said that God guided her to the location of her sunglasses, and lo and behold, when she looked down, there they were!

Yes, sunglass miracles. Now you've heard it all.

[The Spartan]

It's amazing to me the petty problems people will credit god with solving. But real problems like children starving to death... No! That's all part of God's Great Plan™.

[wolveraptor]

My favourite miracle testimony was the woman who lost her sunglasses on the beach. She said that God guided her to the location of her sunglasses, and lo and behold, when she looked down, there they were!

Yes, sunglass miracles. Now you've heard it all.

...wow...

Isn't that almost heretical? She implies that she's so important in God's eyes that he bothers to do that just for her, while ignoring things like the shitholes that are the Middle East and Africa.

[Pint0 Xtreme]

Prior to seriously analyzing Christianity, which ended up in my deconversion, I was never fully satisfied with the type of logic and answers the church offered. I continuously felt that Christian belief had such little logical cohesion. It's extremely puzzling how fundies can be satisfied with such... unsatisfactory answers!!

[AdmiralKanos]

Prior to seriously analyzing Christianity, which ended up in my deconversion, I was never fully satisfied with the type of logic and answers the church offered. I continuously felt that Christian belief had such little logical cohesion. It's extremely puzzling how fundies can be satisfied with such... unsatisfactory answers!!

They teach you to regard your inability to accept nonsensical answers as a failing on your part, rather than a failing of the belief system.

[Enforcer Talen]

one will also point out the miracles get small as the species' critical thinking gets better.

beginning: making the planet
middle: feeding thousands.
modern: finding sunglasses.

[Spyder]

Interesting difference between someone that leaves Christianity and someone that is bourn again in it. The first tends to be open minded, the later is merely easilly swayed.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Okay, here goes. I've got a group of friends who amongst them, have one rather loony evangelical Christian I don't particularly care for. I made the mistake some time ago of telling her exactly how I felt on the matter of organized religion, and the actions of some groups of Christians in the US... and was that a mistake. She's told me how much of a 'secular lie' Evolution is, why Jesus turned her into a good person, and why she is a YEC. I then promptly refuted every single claim she made with those silly 'facts'. So then it came to this...

Her: "Laura, why don't you believe in God? Don't you want to go to heaven? Jesus died for you..."
Me: "Heaven? I don't see any reason to believe in Heaven over say.. Elysium... or Valhalla?"
Her: "Because Jesus died for you. He was the son of God."
Me: "So was Apollo. Point?"
Her: "Jesus loves you, that's why. You need to turn away from the Devil."
Me: "How do you know Jesus OR the Devil exists? We can't prove it or even observe a thing."
Her: "Of course they exist. You've been taught lies. Don't worry, I'll save you!"
Me: "You're full of it."
Her: "Come on! You need to accept Christ to be a good person!"

Et Cetera. Ad nasueum et infinitum.

By the invisible sky-wizard, I felt my intelligence drop twenty or thirty points just reading that.

So the questions. What do you peeps think?

1. Why are the converted so much more... em. Aggressive about their beliefs than others? I've had several experiences trying to fight off convert Christians, Jehovas, Mormons and even $cientologists.

Because Christianity is a prosetylizing religion. Its converts are taught to bring the Word to the heathens, so that they may be saved from Satan and eternal damnation. They are taught this from childhood forward.

2. Even though reason and faith seem to have an inverse relationship, how are 'Jesus died for you' and 'Don't you want to go to heaven' arguments in their minds?

Because they've been taught this from childhood, so it's buried deep below what rational, reasoned thought processes they have. They're also taught that the only evidence you need about God and Jesus is the Bible. And they're also taught to read and interpret the Bible in a very specific way.

3. Why the hell do they assume you already believe in God/Satan/etc, a
nd are just denying it?

Because people originally evolved to live in small, nomadic hunter-gatherer groups. As a result, everyone the typical early human knew was likely to have the same beliefs and ways of doing things, ruthlessly reinforced by the small closely-knit functional group they lived in. Problem is, cultural and technological evolution have far outstripped our biological evolution. So even though one is likely to know many more people now, they still project their paleolithic assumptions on you.

4. Where is the origin of this apparently quite common 'You need to love Jesus to be good' garbage?

They're indoctrinated into it. It's related to the whole "Salvation can only come from Christ" motif. The logic followed is thus:
A) You can only get into heaven by accepting Christ.
B) Good people go to heaven, bad people go to Hell.
C) From A and B, it follows that good people accept Christ.

5. How can anyone with half a mind just say 'Well, my beliefs are the utter, proven truth. The other religions are clearly commie lies.'

Because their programming is buried deep in their subconsciousness. It's almost an instinctive reaction by the time their brain settles into its adult state.

[Spoonist]

Since most of our learning is based on a trust in authority your brain and ways of thinking is conditioned to defend the ideas that your authority upholds.
Being newly converted usually means that you have invested a huge idea of your own selfimage in the values of your new faith. "JC was good. His followers are good people. Thus I'm a good person." By critizising that persons faith you are perceived to attack the selfimage of the person as well. That will often lead to an aggressive response of the selfimage and thus the belief system and the authority propagating the belief system.

For instance if you perceive yourself as a part of a subculture like star wars fans, you usually put certain values to this. Then if someone would criticize star wars fans and call them something the instinctive reaction would to be defend star wars fans as a whole because you see it as an attack upon your selfimage.
Now religous cults use this to an extreme by building a large we-them feeling, we will be saved-they will burn, which again propagates the feeling of being chosen/selected/valued/significant or whatever gets you motivated. This means that attacks on the belief system inherently removes your self worth since you attach those qualities to the belief system.
You can also see the same behavior in people who advocate a certain political party and have nothing critical to say about it. Or nationalists who tout there country above others without seeing it's flaws.

This is why the scientific principle and critical thinking is so important. Always question your own beliefs and test them against reality, and if it works out you will be the stronger for it. but if you rely on a mental crouch and then that crouch is removed you will fall.

Another point in question outside religion would be national socialistic germany in the 30's.


(sorry for the ramble)

[Darth Servo]

My favourite miracle testimony was the woman who lost her sunglasses on the beach. She said that God guided her to the location of her sunglasses, and lo and behold, when she looked down, there they were!

Yes, sunglass miracles. Now you've heard it all.

Oh, I've heard women claim God inspired them to style their hair a certain way.

[wolveraptor]

Because people originally evolved to live in small, nomadic hunter-gatherer groups. As a result, everyone the typical early human knew was likely to have the same beliefs and ways of doing things, ruthlessly reinforced by the small closely-knit functional group they lived in. Problem is, cultural and technological evolution have far outstripped our biological evolution. So even though one is likely to know many more people now, they still project their paleolithic assumptions on you.

Wow, the monkeysphere really IS everywhere. Our minds can't truly wrap themselves around the idea that there are billions of completely unique individuals out there. We have to reduce them to 1 dimensional figures in order to grasp it. Fundies have even smaller monkeyspheres than others, so they have to group all the godless heathens under one monolithic banner, assuming they're all denying Christ.

[Zero]

Ironically, you're grouping all fundies into a category just by saying this.

[wolveraptor]

D'oh!

You see? The monkeysphere is unavoidable!

[Zero]

Nah, just avoid tagging on too many lables to any one person before really talking to them a bit. Some people aren't quite as stupid as they seem, initially. Just remember, there's more to any fundy then being a fundy. Lol.

[wolveraptor]

Ghetto Edit: I should say that this doesn't mean you can't make any general statements though. The mindset I described above can be attributed to some fundies as the reason why they feel the way they do, with minor variances due to the individuality of human nature and experiences of course.

[Molyneux]

In that case, wouldn't the only way to avoid the monkeysphere be to consciously make the decision to invest effort in everyone who you come across? Say 'hi', find out their name, that kind of thing?

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

In that case, wouldn't the only way to avoid the monkeysphere be to consciously make the decision to invest effort in everyone who you come across? Say 'hi', find out their name, that kind of thing?

Yep, the only way past it is to consciously make the effort to go against almost every one of your instinctive inclinations. And even then, it's arguable if your brain can even keep track of that many different viewpoints without automatically wanting to generalize things into little boxes.

[wolveraptor]

You can't. The human brain, being wired like other monkey brains, only bigger, can only truly know 150 people (approximately). Consequently, the largest tribes or nomadic groups would be around that size.

[Coyote]

1. Why are the converted so much more... em. Aggressive about their beliefs than others?

They want to validate their own conversion experience by convincing other people to jump on the bandwagon with them, thus giving the warm fuzzy feeling of... um... groupthink.

2. Even though reason and faith seem to have an inverse relationship, how are 'Jesus died for you' and 'Don't you want to go to heaven' arguments in their minds?

Once they've accepted the Bible as the true and unadulterated word of God Himself, then there is no more "absolute truth" than the concept of "Because". It hearkens back to the argument of "because I'm the parent, that's why!" argument some kids get when their parents refuse to allow them to do something for reasons that are not obvious to the child.

The logical extension of this argument is that religion wants to put you in the point of view of being a child in relation to the parent-- invoking warm feelings of protection and sustainment.

3. Why the hell do they assume you already believe in God/Satan/etc, and are just denying it?

They've accepted it and they cannot comprehend a world-view that does not include these grand, encompassing concepts. To them, there are but two responses to God: accept/embrace (the path they chose) and hide-in-fear. Since you obviously have not chosen "accept and embrace", then in their worldview, that leaves only....

4. Where is the origin of this apparently quite common 'You need to love Jesus to be good' garbage?

New Testament, John 3:16, paraphrased: "for God loved the world so much he gave his only begotten son to die for the sins of mankind" It goes on to include "I am the Way and the Truth and the Light and only he who believeith in me shall find a place in the Kingdom of Heaven".

So... after Adam and Eve, and the Flood of Noah, mankind was tainted in sin. So (according to Christianity) God decided to give people the chance to redeem themselves by sending Jesus as a sacrifice to die on behalf of all humanity. He dies as an atonement for mankind's evil-- if you accept his sacrifice on your behalf, bingo! Instant reservations to Heaven.

So, if you are willing to accept Jesus as your Savior, then you get to go to Heaven. Accepting Jesus means living according to a certain set of rules or guidelines that prescribe behavior. Doing all this will save your soul from eternal Damnation. (Again-- according to Christians and their spin-off like the Mormons... I dunno about Scientology beliefs).

5. How can anyone with half a mind just say 'Well, my beliefs are the utter, proven truth. The other religions are clearly commie lies.'

Again, it validates their own experience-- if she chooses Christianity, but you chose... Islam. Or Atheism. Or... whatever else, then it reminds her that there are other alternatives out there, and hers may not be the only way... or the right way. Many dyed-in-the-wool Christians seem stunned that I not only exist without Jesus (I'm Jewish) but I am not struck by lightning because of it as well. It shakes up that "I am the Way, the Light, and the Truth" self-centeredness.

Anyone else have a recent encounter of these sorts?

All the time. I used to be treally pissed off by it but than I kind of realized that from the point of view of these people, they honestly believe that they are trying to save your soul from a horrible fate. It's rather touching, in a way, their fondness. But whatever-- I don't buy it.

[Coyote]

It strikes me as a little interesting that people here are talking about techniques for converting people away from God. Is it not as bad to try and seek people to see the world your way as it is to force them on to yours?

Two points:

1) "Away from fundamentalism" is not the same as "Away from God".

2) There is a difference between indoctrination (which is what's done to Christians as children) and encouraging people to look at the world logically.

As an aside, I think this caveat that you issue here is the place where soooo many people get you wrong. I figured it out shortly after I came to the board and had a preconceived mistaken notion about accepting a scientific 'theory' as a sort of 'faith' by a different term.

In the long run you're about respect-- and Fundamentalism inherently disrespects people's right to think and chose on their own.