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I'm saying that most women should get children. Some can just get married or just stay single.
Like I said for Germany as an example. Why are they getting so many Syrian refuges? Since they have a grand decline in their population. The German people themselves decided to not have as many kids or no kids at all as before. Now they're getting half a million into the country since they hold stronger family values.
Well why didn't the Germans decided it best to have children of their own to take on jobs of the future instead of refugees? The same can be said for Spain for example where in a few decades it will have a large decrease in its population.
It at least necessary to keep the population stable in order to keep the community and nation stable.
You are truly daft. A nation cannot decide if a person should have kids or not. That is an individual choice.You keep interjecting unrelated issues into this thread and in doing so displaying a complete lack of respect for individual freedom. What does it matter if Germans or Spanish individuals decide to not have kids.? Why should it be any concern of yours? The fact that Germany has taken in refugees is an issue of humanity not population expansion in the first place. You really need to re-evauate your values. You have a total lack of respect for individual freedoms.
Unbalanced : "Like I said for Germany as an example. Why are they getting so many Syrian refuges? Since they have a grand decline in their population. The German people themselves decided to not have as many kids or no kids at all as before. Now they're getting half a million into the country since they hold stronger family values."
It seems you are confusing Germany's policy of offering political asylum with a policy of reversing diminishing population. I do not believe Germany is accepting refugees and immigrants to bolster their population. There is a backlash against immigration in many western nations.
It seems you are confusing fertility with personal choice. Germany does not suffer from low fertility. Fertility is defined as the ability to reproduce not how many children a person chooses to have. Are you saying that western values have diminished German peoples ability to have children? If so that is laughable. I am sure that population decline in western nations is related to use of condoms and contraceptives not sinfulness causing sterility.
I am sure of one thing. The Abrahamic religions are tyrannical and anti-life . The only way to promulgate their creeds is by subjugating children with fear of hell fire in the next life or this one. Keeping woman as breeding chattel and children afraid of even considering apostasy is the very best E.S.S. for these cultural memes called faith.
Addendum : Please do not dodge my previous question. Regardless of what you think women should or should not do , my question was in regard to potential. Is a woman's only "potential" in life being a reproductive slave? Is a woman who has chosen a career over children wasting her potential?
For your question before I don't believe that she is wasting her potential. She can find a job and work and help humanity discover something new. Women shouldn't be reproductive slaves either. I'm not saying all women have to get married as I said before. But I urge most to do that.
Aside from the examples I told you about I know a handful more of families of whom the father and mother work and their kids turned out to socially inadequate and didn't show that much love for their parent's since they couldn't see one of them the whole time at home.
Do you know any real life examples to prove this wrong?
"Do you know any real life examples to prove this wrong?"
If you're looking for and relying only on anecdotal evidence, as you seem to be doing throughout your posts (and probably in your life) then my family is a dandy example to prove your nonsense is wrong.
Unbalanced : "For your question before I don't believe that she is wasting her potential. She can find a job and work and help humanity discover something new."
OK. Perhaps I misunderstood. Can you please clarify what you meant by this statement:
"But then comes the issue of raising children and staring a family. If the woman is too independent than she wouldn't want to get married and settle down so easily when she gets a degree. That I understand its stupid to waste half of the potential of the population."
Then :
"Aside from the examples I told you about I know a handful more of families of whom the father and mother work and their kids turned out to socially inadequate and didn't show that much love for their parent's since they couldn't see one of them the whole time at home.
Do you know any real life examples to prove this wrong?"
Yes. Most certainly. I actually know examples of people who turned out very socially inadequate simply because of their parents being home too much. These people might have had a better chance if their parents had gone to work more.
Alternatively , I am proud to know of two women who did not have children. They are celebrating close to 50 years together as lovers and were legally married a few years ago. They were both high school teachers of mine. They had a tremendous influence on me and many other people. I keep in touch with them to this day. I graduated high school 39 years ago. The world is a better place because of them.
You don't actually ask too many questions, your "questions" seem more like an open into philosophical dialogue. About sex and marriage... it's a fun discussion for anyone with an open mind to engage in a discussion about what marriage is, and it's relationship to a person's behavior (sex).
What is marriage? Is it a contract, a legal obligation? Or some form of tradition mixed with mysticism? What's the purpose of marriage? Does it exist to lay the legal foundations of responsibility of raising a family? Or merely a social declaration of "in a relationship"?
Depending on what you personally see marriage as influences your thoughts as to whether the decline of marriage is a good or bad thing. As you can tell, as an atheist I see it more as a tradition of religious types, that has been translated into a kind of legal contract. What exactly this mystic legality seeks to do is a bit vague... but overall I'd say that it's decline isn't exactly frightening. People will still love, still have kids, still live life even if marriage dissapears. Hell, before humanity could write or speak... before we contrived marriage, we seemed to survive and prosper as a species. I'm not too worried about its decline or possible disapearance. In its absence, people will find and develope new societal norms about dating and sex. Which is exactly what has been occuring.
Yes, today's world has more sex. Tons more of it. The sexual revolution 60's in America and advent of birth control shifted the point of sex away from a biological function... a kind of equation of "pleasure in exchange for the pains of procreation". Now, it's something we can do for mere pleasure and enjoyment. No need to have the legal contract of marriage in place to ensure a child will be cared for. Because... and I'm pulling this statistic straight out of my ass based on how much sex people claim to have versus how many kids they have... but it seems like 99.99% of sex never results in a child.
So I guess the real question is... do we even need marriage in the world? What will it's function be in a world where sex can be had without repercussion? Will it exist solely as a legal contract to ensure someone(s) are financially responsible for a child's well being?
And as for the rape thing and womens dress... yes, men can control themselves. And here's where I draw this from... not it's not unheard of for sexual assaults to occure in public areas. But even when they do, the perpetrator does it in a secluded area. Most sexual assaults are done out of the public eye in isolated areas. Or atleast perceived to be isolated by the perpetrator. Why is this important? Because out in the public eye and for the vast majority of their lives, rapists aren't sexually assaulting people. They do it when they think they can get away with it. Let me repeat that... "they do it when they think they can get away with it". That means... for the most part of their lives, rapists are controlling their sexual urges to avoid being caught and punished, and rape in situations in where they think they will not be caught. Yes. Men, all men, can control their sexuality and choices. Rapist's actively choose to rape. It's not a women's fault or the clothes she wears, or statistically speaking nudist beaches, would be the epicenter of a rape epidemic. And in reality they aren't. Statistically most rapes still occur in suburban areas, back alleys, and in buildings. And rapes in nudist beaches are comparably the same as in most any open public space. Even rapists control their sexual urges under fear of punishmemt. So no, a woman's dress does not have an influence over a man's capability to control themselves. That's just a fucking stupid assumption.
We can have sex for fun. That I agree with but it is also necessary for a person to form a family in order to keep the human population at the very least stable.
When a person has many divorces or dates too much and this type of culture spreads about then it will be harder for people to get married and have children.
Wouldn't it be nice when your somewhere in your seventies to eighties and you have your children and your grand children huddled together around you as you tell them stories and what not?
I for one would want that to happen and I feel that most people who say other wise will regret it when they're that old.
Unbalanced - "it is also necessary for a person to form a family in order to keep the human population at the very least stable."
The human population is growing by more than 1% per year. I don't know where you are getting these ideas that it is shrinking.
Unbalanced said "So this has led to many divorces and a low fertility rate as can be seen in Europe. So how should atheists deal with this issue? You have made sex easy for everyone. Sex is great, I think its great and I wish I can do it several times a day but if the population isn't going to be at least stable doesn't that mean that you are killing your own kind and eventually replacing it with religious families who care about families as its happening in Germany?"
Me:Sexual freedom has not led to more divorces. Divorce don't happen in countries that don't allow divorce. So you assumption is all wrong there.
Unbalanced said "Also when it comes to issues about "Stop staring at my body!", perverts, and rape in general. Is it possible to halt the urges of men to not look at women's bodies if they're wearking skimpy clothes on the streets. Can we go to the point where the natural tendencies of a man to love sex more than a woman to minimized and we can teach them since they were young to not be so obsessed with sex in a society which is and actually help decrease the amount of rape in the world?"
Me: You don't stop rape by oppressing women. You stop rape by educating men not to objectify women and punish the rapist. You have embarked on the same old problem of blaming the victim for the crime.
Unbalanced: "Second comes to things like alcohol. Now what I have seen with my friends that if you drink it in moderate terms then its alright but here's the thing. Not everyone does that. They see it as a way to run away from their troubles. Many people have suffered from it as you know since its addictive and can cause them to do terrible things and destroy their livelihoods.
So is alcohol really a good thing to keep in our society?
(I would rather live in a world with weed than alcohol)"
Me: True some people are irresponsible with alcohol and other things. That doesn't make it right for you, religion or anyone else to deny them the right to choose what they do. You get the ones that need it help and punish those who commit crimes as a result of using alcohol.
Unbalanced: "But even if she does get married and has kids how much time does she have to spare for her children. If she isn't around them most of the time since she has to work and then relax for a while at home without seeing her children running around and shouting everywhere then they won't be able to see there mother very often which is a problem.
If she gets a maid or her mom to take care of her children then they'll see this person as more of their mom than their actual mother."
Me: that is just a stupid statement, as if a father has no responsibility to raise children. I could go on and on about this but I would be wasting my time.
You are truly unbalanced. You haven't a clue about individual freedom OR responsibility. You either need to be deprogrammed and reeducated, that is if you are actually educated in the first place, or just get some experience in the real world.
Your concepts of gender roles is about as stupid as they can be. Your cousins problem aren't because your aunt has a job. That is insane.
And please please please don't even bother discussing homosexuality. If this post is any indication of how you look at things then there is no way you can understand a thing about homosexuality.
It's obvious that you don't understand the rights of an individual, and that women have the same rights as men. Instead you blame women and place the power of making decisions concerning individuals in a religion. What has religion done with that power? Oppressed, enslaved, committed murder and genocide, culturalcide, created prejudice and racism, started wars and abetted tyrants. Until you can get a grip on reality don't bother with discussions. You cannot understand the basics of humanity and individual freedom, therefore you are illequiped to discuss society in general.
Mykcob4,
Why do you insult Unbalanced? He was raised in a culture with radically different views, so it should not be surprising that he rationalizes in accordance with that culture. Everyone, including us, takes the view that their culture is superior. Most of those living in historic times, I suspect, would also feel the same about their culture. An ancient Roman would probably think our culture is crazy. How does one even go about arguing that one culture is better than another without beginning with culture-based assumptions? I think some good arguments can be made for our values, but it's not necessarily a cake walk. Perhaps, we should concentrate more on bringing out why certain cultural views are disagreeable to us.
As for the role of women, I took 9th grade science under Dr. Easter Cupp. The entire school faculty probably had no more than 3 PhDs. Dr. Cupp was also one of the women pioneers in oceanography and did some serious science. Her connections at Scripps Institute at La Jolla, California got my brother into a summer science program--working with Arnold and other world-class scientists. I could never accept any values in a culture that would have regulated her to a housewife.
Well well well... you sure have a lot of energy. Now like the rest of the people around here who discussed about what I said yours really caught my eye (mostly since you kinda roasted me).
I understand why you were quite offensive here. You come from a culture that is widely diffrent than mine and since you see yourself as superior you feel its justified to offend me. I feel that in general you should try to be more open when there someone else with diffrent ideas that your own.
Either ways for your refutations about alcohol and rape seem convincing and I need to do more research about them but for the one about gender roles still seems a little stingy for me.
Perhaps my Uncle's issue doesn't represent all families where the mother and father work but it does have an affect on the child when he or she can't see one of their parents at least the whole time. There is another story I know about my mother's friend who's German and lived her whole life there. But she converted into Islam since mostly because when she was young her mother would put her outside on the garden and let her play there since she wants to relax a while alone. It happened to her many times and she felt distressed by that for a long time. Now she decided it best to stay with her children at home and to take care of them.
Perhaps I might be wrong. There can be other examples. (If you have any real life examples I'd be happy to hear them)
1) I have been all over the world. 2) I have been among cultures quite different from my own, to include Islamic, African, and Asian, cultures. 3) Basic humanity is basic humanity. It isn't different just because you live in a different culture. Some cultures need to come out of the dark ages and see people as individuals. Your views on things maybe culturally induced but there are far from reality. You need to realize that people ALL people are individuals and therefore have individual rights. That religion ALL religions oppress individuals and restrict individual rights. That religion is institutional slavery not culture. It's institutional tyranny. NOT culture. Culture has to do with food, language, music, art, literature. Institutional tyranny may indeed be part of a norm in a culture but it is still tyranny. It's not a women's job to just take care of children. Parenting is the job of both parents. Love nurturing, compassion, care, and discipline are the keys to raising a child. A women can work, be a professional and still raise a child correctly. It happens everyday all over the world. A women has as much right to a career as a man, as much right to a full life as a man. Her role in life is not just to raise children in ANY culture, any where. You need to start thinking of people as individuals with individual rights and responsibilities. Don't blame your gender prejudices on a cultural bias. That is a cop out and just a lie. If you are blaming biases that you harbor on your culture, then you are just surrendering your own identity, your own responsibility, your own humanity over to what YOU call culture. You obviously need to learn what it is to be an individual and be responsible for yourself.
When you state things like the "role of women" you are not understanding the individual right of any women, AND your are not accepting that it is your own individual prejudice that imposing that oppression. When you act and think as an individual, and treat people as individuals, then you will break this religious slavery bond that you call culture.
When you talk about women and dressing skimpy, you fail to realize that any man that would objectify her or worse commit rape of such a women bares the crime that that man committed. You can't dictate what women should wear because men get excited.
In nudist colonies if a woman is raped, it is still a crime committed by the rapist not the victim that is raped. So I am not buying this cultural excuse at all. It is YOU that bears the responsibility of how you feel and think about people, not your "culture."
Sex is just a union of bodies for the purposes of euphoria or child-manufacture.
Marriage is simply a decision by lovers to stay together for whatever purpose they have.
Anything more than this is bloody propaganda.
You can't make men quit ogling.Scientifically,curvy female bodies(boobs and ass) are a sign of fertility due to high levels of oestrogen.The bigger the curves,the more fertile the woman;thus evolution in its effort to preserve the human species made men attracted to the curves ensuring copulation guaranteed high quality kids with high chances of survival.So you can't stop years of evolution with a regulation or religion.Religious leaders will deny it to death but they still feel a tingling sensation in their pants when they see that 'blessed' socialite curvewise.
To ensure that men didn't just fuck,get a kid and skip away happily to the next target,humans evolved the ability to love leading to marriage thus enabling the man produce multiple quality offspring and sticking around to ensure they survived to maturity.
But humans are clever and decided to cut the middle man(pregnancy) and invented the condom and other contraceptives to keep pregnancy out of pleasure.Some religions still discourage birth control.How stupid,going around saying how an invisible tyrant commanded dudes to fill the earth.Well,its already full.Bloody enemies of progress.
I've vaguely simplified but I think it gets the point across about ogling,sex,marriage and boobs.Note that I have not mentioned religion nor 'god' anywhere because its all bullshit.If that doesn't sink,I don't know what will.Good luck on.......whatever you decide really.
Unbalanced doesn't understand that rape isn't about sex. It's about power.
Rape is a particularly difficult crime because it's about both power and violence. Rapists use sex organs as the locus of their violence, but rape isn't about sex, at least not in the sense of being motivated by sexual attraction or an uncontrollable sexual urge.Aug 29, 2013
https://www.mnsu.edu/varp/assault/myths.html
Myth: The primary motive for rape is impulsive sexual desire.
Fact: Studies show that the major motive for rape is power, not sex. Sex is used as a weapon to inflict pain, violence and humiliation. Most rapists appear to have normal personalities with an abnormal tendency to be aggressive and violent. Between 2/3 and 3/4 of sexual assaults are planned in advance.
The subject of religion appears to have become irrelevant to the discussion. Whatever one's views on rape, women's fashion choices, role in society and careers the point of religion is presumably belief in a specific deity. If there's no belief one leaves the religion (if the consequences can be borne).
Believers in Abrahamic god(s) are atheists regarding all the other gods and pantheons.
We're on the discussion of whether these ideas that I presented in the beginning which are part of Islam are correct or not. We're still on the same page here.
We are discussing which doctrine is correct and which one isn't.
First off, the idea that a doctrine is 'correct' is crazy.
2nd off: you seem to believe sex is evil, nakedness is evil, that divorce is evil, that women's flesh has a magical power over men to cause them to rape them, that women should be the ones to raise children, that the world is in danger of under-population. Of course you think Islam brings the correct doctrine! You were raised in an iron age religion, which imposed an iron age world view/philosophy (see above), so of course you think the iron age religion is correct. Can't you see it is self re-enforcing?
Try starting over with 'god isn't real', 'sex is normal human behaviour', and 'homosexually is natural'; then check how well your iron age doctrine fits.
"We are discussing which doctrine is correct and which one isn't."
I'm not. A person might follow a doctrine but I have no doctrine. A doctrine may be "part of Islam" or not. I'm not religious so I couldn't care less. I simply defend the rights of all and refuse to accept that men have much say in how women dress.
Morality has nothing to do with religion. If something is considered by a society as so immoral that action must be taken, then it is for the democratic society as a whole to determine that action and so the line between what is acceptable and what isn't. People may have whatever doctrine, religion, ideology they like but there can only be one law for all.
Myke sensibly pointed out the connection between rape and power. I would also mention that relatively few men can rape a distressed or reluctant woman (however she dresses or behaves). During warfare perhaps many men can become brutalized and capable of attacking women and other defenceless individuals they never would in a peaceful, secure and supportive environment. A person is part nature part nurture. I like to think that if rape were made legal tomorrow no contributor in this thread would rape anyone or even want to do so.
If a man with reasonably normal psychology is placed in a room with a beautiful woman and she is totally at his mercy, would he rape her? For the majority of men it is the good, reciprocal relationship that makes it sexy and arousing. No relationship - no arousal, (fantasies aside perhaps! :-)
I just want to say that sex is a natural stimulus but it can be controlled by brain if someone has enough power to do it. If two persons are ready to do sex and there is no legal restriction like age, so who are us to stop them. two persons are free to enjoy themselves if they don't have any legal obligation. Population can control by awareing society about the precautions before doing sex on teenager level specially. Everything has advantages and disadvantages so its on us how to use it so use alcohol as it should be. Actually when you banned something then people will try to do it more and in this way they just create problems for themselves and society. Woman can independently live his life even having a child , depends on her how she care for her child. I saw many woman having more civilized children's than a housewife can have.
Well as I have read all your posts I think its time for an end to this discussion.
I have decided to leave Islam.
After what you told me and enough research on the side I have realized that Islam is just wrong and that science, liberalism, and simple logic are right.
Thank you to everyone here who has helped me out to change my beliefs. I have now become an agonist atheist.
The transition seems a little tough for me. Its as if my mind wants me to go back to Islam. But I know better than that and I will keep on fighting that urge to go back.
Again thanks to everyone who bared through my ignorant B.S. and responded back
Unbalanced,
Welcome to a brave, new world! It takes a lot of people two or three years to fully and completely shake off their religion. Religion is not just a belief that can be dropped cleanly by discovering a logical flaw, as though you were "Spock" on Star Trek. It is a whole way of looking at things, complete with circles of religious friends and family. As you make the transition I think you will feel a kind of wonderful freedom.
Do read "Losing Faith in Faith" by Dan Barker. He was once deeply into conservative Christianity. At that time he wrote songs that many Christians sing to this day. He even hopped fences in Mexico to try to convert people to his brand of Christianity! The book is about Dan's long and hard road that eventually led him to atheism. Today, Dan Barker is one of the leading atheists in the United States.
Best Wishes
"The transition seems a little tough for me. Its as if my mind wants me to go back to Islam."
I think that is probably a normal reaction. I've heard many people who have left religion (mostly Christianity because of where I live) say similar things. Good luck!
Right now it has been my first week not praying!
I left Islam exactly may 19, it'll be like my atheist anniversary
But thanks again for helping me out through this. I always felt my beliefs were slowly disappearing everyday.
yea, good luck with your life and enjoy a life without feeling guilty of not being perfect.
Good for you!
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