Anyone else think we should adopt "The Atheist Crew" as a collective label for the site community? ^.^

Reporters don’t lie

...you can't be serious. (Unless you would contend that nothing less than complete fabrication of information constitutes "lying").

What I find disturbing is that with a little heat, he denies making that claim, instead saying he was misquoted. Reporters don’t lie, and don’t write things like that unless they can back up those statements. Benny Franks' back-pedalling lies don't even make sense in this article. He made the statement in El Paso, not Bowie County, out of the hopes that he wouldn't get caught. It didn't work.

Poor Benny Franks is a typical Democrap. He’ll tell people in El Paso one thing but won’t tell the truth in Bowie County, since he doesn’t want to upset anyone in the Bible Belt. He’s a terriffic liar. If he thinks that’s what they want to hear, he’ll say it.

Should be a good year for Bowie County Republicans.

I find myself filled with a great sense of worth when I read it. I feel honored to be an atheist.

Even ignoring the qualifier which your repeatedly stated positions imply...at the risk of inviting (perhaps incompletely unfounded) accusations of "ad hominem," considering the list of philosophies, attitudes, and agendas in which you see no harm and of which, in many cases, you even openly approve, the fact that you see no harm in this does little to recommend it. More objectively, do you really believe that people are going to be amenable to being "enlightened" by us after we've enlightened them to the point where they realize we've cynically duped them, too? Or that, having duped the gullible masses, no part of the atheist community will fail to resist the temptation to resist abusing their power over the people? You've read Animal Farm, I assume...the course you describe would have the same potential problems and probably the same outcome (though I will concede that there probably would be a minimum of windmills involved).

I know, most of you wish to enlighten the masses. But they have been duped into believing the nonsense preached from pulpits. The solution: dupe them again, but only to your side this time. Once duped again, you can begin enlightening them.

As the word "atheist" has been so maligned by theists and associated in the popular mind with wickedness, perhaps we should take a leaf from the creationist's book and fly under a new name. Partially taking the creationist's example we could call our view of the world "Intelligent Weltanschauung". Maybe others have some better or less Teutonic suggestions.

I think the points Adam raises about this are valid ones.

In this respect, I disagree with efforts (like those of the Brights) to coin a new term. We already have a perfectly good one: atheist. We should say what we are plainly and not allow our enemies to usurp or pollute the word. If we avoid using it to describe ourselves because we fear the repercussions, we play into their game. We harm and hinder our own movement when we abandon these words to our enemies as a way to tar us, and what is to stop them from similarly smearing any new word we come up with?

As for taking a leaf from the creationists' book, I have serious misgivings about this idea. It would feel a bit too much like gaining popularity by promising land to farmers, bread to workers, and peace to soldiers.