A Hoax?

The people at Triablogue are having the last laugh. First they did a parody of people at The Secular Outpost (scroll down or search for “Triablogue: Flippant dismissals,” and “The plot thickens...,” where they also did one of us here at DC, Flippant Dismissals . Recently they did one of themselves You Heard it First From Me, where they claimed their own Blog is a hoax.

Another atheist website has asked aloud if this DC Blog is a hoax. Thankfully they decided on their own that it isn’t.

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Added note: This atheist site, Godis4Suckers, has retitled their original post from "Is Debunking Christianity a Hoax?" to the present one where they claim Triablogue is lying about us. But I still say Triablogue is not trying to spread lies about us, another misrepresentation by this atheist site, they were just poking some fun at us. There is enough to attack Christian thinking about that we do not need to misrepresent what they intended.

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Let me say a few things. In the progression of my thought from Christian Apologist to Atheist I went through several stages. I became a liberal Christian, then a Deist, then an Agnostic, and finally an Atheist. This should surprise no one, since that’s what typically happens as one continues to travel down the road of doubt. In my earlier book I described myself as an Existential Deist and I wrote as one. I initially wrote it to explain to people who knew me why I was no longer a Christian. What I didn’t expect is the attention it would get because I am a former student of William Lane Craig’s. And I took a lot of flack from Christians on discussion groups and sites because they didn’t like my book or that I came out with it. As I continued to think through the issues and discussed things with believers and non-believers, I finally became an atheist. So I extensively revised my book. It is so different in the depth of arguments presented, and the topics I discuss, and even the tone itself, that I renamed it: Why I Rejected Christianity.

Triablogue was probably just poking fun--that is all--and I don't mind having a little fun either. Although, Christians on the web try to discredit atheists as much as they can, so if taken that way, they just did what they repeatedly seem to do to atheists. When they cannot answer our arguments they try to discredit us. And they are trying to make a point about the gullibility of we atheists. Don’t buy into it.

If this site is a hoax, what is it a hoax about? That the contributors listed on the sidebar are not really contributors? What would convince you? Ed Babinski and I asked that Farrell Till and Dan Barker join as contributors to help add some more credibility to our site, okay? Whether they actually post much is to be seen, but I suspect that with the controversy they will. But would that convince anyone? This site is not a hoax. We really do exist as the people we say we are. And the people who prefer to be nameless are really there too. We're not mythic--last time I checked! :-) [As far as the supposed dead-end links go, let us know where they are and we'll try to fix them. Sometimes it's merely the Blogger mainframe itself.]

By the way, if according to Christianity our salvation and/or damnation depends so much on getting at the truth, and we all (atheists and believers) come to such a wide diversity of opinions on what someone writes, even in today’s world when we can check them out, or even if the people themselves exist, or if they are presenting a hoax, then it doesn’t offer we humans much hope of getting at the truth at all.

Even though that atheist site is wrong about us, and they are, I still prefer their kind of skepticism to the gullibility of Christians who believe in fairy tales of miraculous events among superstitious people. So to them I say, keep on keeping on…..

Now, back to our regularly scheduled debates…... where any intelligent comment is welcomed.

9 comments:

nsfl said...

Why take them seriously, whether they really mean it [although they wouldn't waste so much time with us if they really thought this site a farce] or not?

Who cares what they think? They come here to engage us, and as of just now, we are averaging 344 visits per day, and 728 page views. I have a blocking cookie installed, and so my own visits aren't counted. I encourage the other bloggers here to do the same -- write me at dmorgan@chem.ufl.edu to get the login information for sitemeter.com so you can too.

Anyway, we have occasionally intellectual conversations with them, but more often than not, trade barbs in the circle jerk of egos that we call "debate". This is but another of their barbs. Don't elevate them to a level of importance that they don't deserve. If they have a point to make against a farcical site, they obviously make it, as a quick and dirty google search for "loftus" yielded 30 hits doing a site search on triablogue and "debunking" yielded 155 (admittedly, some didn't refer to this site).

So they're wasting a lot of breath on a facade, a farce, a hoax, aren't they? Maybe they're just really bored. I wouldn't doubt it.

exbeliever said...

I agree. Most of them aren't up for debate, just name calling (with a couple of exceptions). I feel sorry for any of our readers who click there for any substance.

Anonymous said...

I understand what Danny and ex-believer are saying about Triablogue. I'm just concerned about the possibility that an ugly rumor that starts with Godis4suckers spreads around the internet. As we know, rumors grow exponentially, so nip them in the bud if possible, and if needed. And I don't want to have any problems with sister atheist sites. I'm not opposed to being skeptical when so many Christians seem to discredit us all.

nsfl said...

Godis4suckers may be a "sister site" with regards to their mutual disbelief in God, but I hate it that Triablogue thinks them "sister" to us in any other way.

This site exists for the purpose of debunking and debating. Their site exists "by atheists, for atheists" in their own words. They aren't interested in back-and-forth with theists, and they admitted to have been banning all Triabloguers from commenting on their site.

They have the right to do whatever they want with their site, and it appears they are quite uninterested in engaging in the aspect of the "culture wars" which we are only interested in -- a transparent display of ideological contrasts.

I can't believe they were dumb enough to fall for it. They even went digging around on my sites, without emailing me first, and found them unconvincing. I feel kind of sorry for them having made an ass of themselves. Oh well...

Next time, don't lend credence to their ignorance by posting in response to their credulity. It makes us look like we're coming to their rescue. Hell, even if those rumors had started, it would only have resulted in more traffic and interest in the site. ;)

Anonymous said...

Thanks Danny. I understand. And yet it's my nature to try to get along with everyone as much as possible.

Hey, let's come up with our own little nasty rumor and spread it around....like....John and the members of this Blog are really government agents working to debunk evangelical Christianity for fear of the political power of the Christian right. Their Blog is funded by powerful special interest groups and lobbyists who are opposed to the influence of Christianity in America today.

exbeliever said...

I think the whole thing is funny. I was glad to be counted alongside the Secular Outpost as a hoax site. If you are going to get dumped on, it's better to get dumped on alongside people with good reputations.

I hope this doesn't denigrate into a blog war with god is for suckers. Who cares? If some of them don't find this site compelling, they don't. I'm fine with that. We have different purposes, and different philosophies of blogging.

I also hope that we can avoid hasty generalizations about the contributors to god is for suckers. As I mentioned there, the founder of that blog, Ron, is my brand new graduate advisor in my philosophy program. He has a PhD in philosophy from MIT, and hardly qualifies as one we can call "dumb enough" to fall for anything.

The way I see it, there is no way for us to come out of this without looking like shit. The satirical nature of Steve's original post was obvious to me, but it wasn't to Sean and a couple of others there. So, maybe shame on them for that.

But, then, they came to our own site and read it over and concluded that some Christians were getting the "upper hand," that we have "lost control" of the blog, that we are not debunking what we say we are going to debunk, that our testimonials are "wishy-washy," that we are "still searching to find answers that maybe will lead [us] back to gawd or something," etc.

The problem is that it is impossible to defend ourselves in this situation without looking worse for it. We can't say, "Don't think Christians have the upper hand here," without sounding whiny. They read what we wrote and came to a conclusion. In defending ourselves, however, we look the lamer for it.

It seems to me, the best policy here is to save as much dignity as possible and quietly move on.

nsfl said...

exb,

Hear, hear!

You're right about the hasty generalization. I know precious little of the collective intellect there, and was basing my judgment on their response to one post. And Ra-men to the rest of your post.

paul said...

hey exb,
when i think of "debunking christianity" i don't think of it as exposing it as all false. i'm convinced that Jesus (or whoever wrote on his behalf) was a closet group selectionist, a definate discipline of evolution. most evolutionists are individual selectionists, so that's why Jesus is not usually seen for who he was. my point: there's falseness to expose everywhere. One who debunks is hopefully an open minded person, not a narrow minded person. for instance, you demonstrate your open mindedness by acknowledging Rons intellect and refusing to make generalizations about christians. Hey, if christians can substantiate that what they are saying is true, i'd love to hear it. It's difficult for Christians to say the same about nonies without violating the principle of faith, so they get kind of stuck. they have to argue from a standpoint of closed mindedness since they already know the truth. when one knows something one stops looking at it.

btw, i enjoy your openness and honesty.
paul

Anonymous said...

If there is a war between our sites it's just limited to Sean and myself. He didn't let it die.