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excusetheblood t1_iujn0lw wrote

I don’t think religious people can possibly be truly moral, since everything they do is out of promise of reward and fear of punishment

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Financial-Agency3322 t1_iujof2b wrote

Every action done by every person all day long is done with a mind for potential reward or potential punishment. It is quite literally unavoidable, down to the most secular of cultures.

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excusetheblood t1_iujp58i wrote

If an atheist gives his money or food to a homeless person, what reward is he expecting? What orders to be a decent person is he following? What punishment is he fearful of?

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Financial-Agency3322 t1_iujphfi wrote

Strawman. This presupposes that every action done by a religious person is guided by a scrupulous compulsion to follow some mandatory guideline, enforced primarily or exclusively under fear. This is false.

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excusetheblood t1_iujr51p wrote

If a person believes in an authoritative god who will either reward them with a blissful eternal afterlife or torture them for all eternity based on the decisions they make here on earth, then we can never truly trust their motives to be genuine can we? They’ll feed a homeless person or donate to charity all because they think it will raise their chances to get into Heaven and avoid hell, not because they wanted to do something good for the sake of it. They’ll also execute a gay person, hang a suspected witch, or vote against equal rights for the same reasons

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Financial-Agency3322 t1_iujr9it wrote

Strawman after strawman. Adios.

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excusetheblood t1_iujshhx wrote

You can’t just say “strawman” over and over again, you have to actually explain why I’m wrong and you’re right in order to win people over

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Financial-Agency3322 t1_iujt3nf wrote

Yeah, but I'm done talking to someone who is so intellectually dishonest and manipulative.

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Top-Royal6249 t1_iujp80r wrote

Sounds like you might be a sociopath if you only do things out of self-preservation without caring about others.

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Financial-Agency3322 t1_iujplds wrote

Sounds like you might be a sociopath if you're so unwilling to engage with your peers that you willfully misrepresent me so egregiously that you accuse me of doing something that I've disavowed several times.

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