If there are to be laws against blasphemy shouldn't we hang those who make such claims (starting with such people as the pope, the mullahs running Iran etc. If they really are speaking for God then God will strike the gallows with lightening before the sentence can be carried out. ;-)

That part of the comment was meant to be read tongue-in-cheek. I'm aware atheism is lack of belief in God(s) and that no atheists really view themselves as gods. I wasn't "making a claim" as much as responding in the highly cynical context of blasphemy day.

My point in mentioning ID wasn't to imply that it should be taught "as a relevant theory in biology class," just noting what I see as a double standard that exists in the atheist community - reflected here in this post.

Lastly, whether you've seen the evidence or not is irrelevant. Ebon moderates me, and has banned others. It's his right of course, but fact nonetheless. Like Caiphen notes, such doesn't mean he doesn't promote criticism in other areas, it just means that for whatever reason, Ebon also protects his ideas from criticism in some subset of instances.

I agree with you about Ebon not protecting his ideas from criticism. In addition, I find that he promotes criticism by sometimes allowing a thread to continue until it's been whipped to pieces by a theist's strawman after strawman. Not the least of these being mine prior to my deconversion!

To be honest, his patience is a lot better than mine.

Atheism means lack of a belief in god(s). Hence, your claim that an atheist views himself/herself as a god is nonsensical.

You quoted Ebon: "As I wrote in "Doubting the Sun", any idea that was obviously true, or that could be defended by resort to the evidence, wouldn't have to be protected from criticism."

You replied: "Yeah yeah... then next week you'll go on about why we shouldn't let the ID'ers talk in school. Get consistent."

Note Ebon's mention of "evidence." As soon as IDers present objective experimental or observational evidence showing the existence of the designer in question, Ebon and others might agree with ID being discussed as a relevant theory in biology class.

You wrote: "Yet, [Ebon] often takes certain measures to protect his own ideas from criticism: banning, moderating, closing threads, etc."

Banning, moderating, etc., are actions that are normally taken by the owners of popular blogs and fora that allow commenting. There are numerous reasons for these actions. I've seen no evidence that Ebon has used these routine editorial or maintenance operations for the purpose of "protect[ing] his own ideas from criticism."

I agree with you but I can also understand where everyone else is coming from. To state the obvious, many of us, including myself, are expressing our frustration with religious dogma by being somewhat vulgar in the way we express. This site is our outlet.

Your point is still greatly appreciated.

I doubt anyone who visits this site would yell 'Jesus is a tosser' in the street.

If you were a God you'd be worthy of worship. I'm sure you wouldn't let a human die in a gutter in downtown Delhi or allow 1000 people plus be crushed to death in an earthquake in Sumatra. What's Yahweh's or Allah's excuse I wonder? I know, zip, zero, zilch. Or perhaps some bullshit of free will or showing humanity the horror of Satan. What crap.

I can't believe I made such a nut of myself at one time being a person of faith!

I don’t agree that blaspheming or swearing should be illegal simply because they don't actually harm anybody, but there are plenty of people who have no regard for manners or are just so insensitive they don't realise that what they are saying can offend people.

The word 'cunt' doesn't offend me in the slightest. But I still would not walk around saying it to everybody in the street because I know I am likely to offend somebody. In the same way, I have no problems blaspheming, but it is wrong to purposely go out of my way to offend somebody with my blasphemous words. People do not have a right not to be offended, but a little bit of politeness and discretion never hurt anybody.

Mock yourself; after all this is a blasphemy day post and you are your own god, right?

No thank you; no, that was last week; and no I am not. If I believed that I was, in fact, God, I would not be an atheist. Unless I were also a solipsist. Or something.

Anyways, I'm not "thumping on" about anything here other than the facts that I think blasphemy day is a religio-political mistake that passes the microphone to the wrong people...

Ah, so that's what you were getting at when you made an entirely unrelated remark about intelligent design.

He says, "..any idea that was obviously true, or that could be defended by resort to the evidence, wouldn't have to be protected from criticism." Yet, he himself often takes certain measures to protect his own ideas from criticism: banning, moderating, closing threads, etc.

I wonder what incident this could possibly refer to.

Yes, some of these times - probably almost all of them - such happens after discussion has ensued and the people involved are vitriolic idiots.

I have no comment.