Bill must just hide behind the term agnostic like most atheists do. I can't blame him as I did for years before I realized that I was an atheist. Maybe I'll look for a good contact e-mail for him and send him the link to the RRS. Maybe he would give the group a well deserved plug.

  good points everyone. i thought about this after i posted and yeah i think more people will go see the movie if they are not offended before they even consider seeing it. Bill is probably a better politician than i realized!

I hope it doesn't, but i think the movie will flop.  Bill M. tends to have a condecending tone about him, which is unfortunate because for the most part i think he is a very positve TV personality.

It is near impossible for a movie of this nature no not "flop". The saving grace for these documentaries is that, often times, the budget is so low that really if ANYONE goes to see if they will not be in the hole. That is an exageration obviously but you get the point.

There are enough atheists and moderates out there that I'm sure the movie will do well in accordance with how many theaters actually carry it. Bill Maher is a pretty good poster boy for skepticism. Like it has been pointed out before he does not challenge common usage of terms but I think that's because he doesn't sweat all of the little stuff. That's just not his approach... right or wrong.

Avoiding calling himself an atheist is a good approach. He is basically just rolling with the scemantic punches. From what I have seen he is more interested in asking basic questions and letting the theists make fools of themselves. He's not trying to trump them so much as he is just letting them talk and the magic just happens. Now, anyone that has watched him for any period of time knows that he goes on the attack frequently and quite aggressively. From what I have seen of this movie and what he has said about it, however, I think he lets the engine idle and watches inertia do the rest.

Being mostly ignorant of American tax law as I am, I may sound foolish here, but it seems to me that the RRS could theoretically become a registered charity and recieve tax exempt status as a result, without having to touch religion.

As long as the RRS itself didn't promote those threads or positions, it shouldn't be a problem. You make a good point though. Things would need to be changed a bit.

Well in addition to being an atheist I'm an anti theist and more particular anti-christian dedicated to the total destruction of christianity as an ideology and all similar.

And even through I don't believe in god the christian fictional god is so utterly evil if someone could prove it existed I would dedicate myself to its destruction.

Religious christians are not only unfit to be in politics they are also unfit to be parents or have any position of any authority and any christian that brings up a child to have a fear of hell is no better than a paedophile and should be locked up for a long time.

 

Is that a subtle enough form of atheism .

 

Just want to make sure christians realise I despise their ideology as much as they despise my love of reality

 

 

 

 

I wrote about it on my blog today.  I haven't been here for a while, and I was looking for Sapients take on Maher.  I knew he would notice

Maher is misrepresenting atheists, and it is really disturbing that he is using theist rhetoric against us.

Oh no he din't!!!

Who the hell does Ray Comfort think he is?!?!?

Oh that shit pisses me off!

LOL,  mrjonno 

I would say you are absolutly correct but that the point is not relevant.

He is adding to the whole language confusion that people seem insistant upon spreading. Wouldn't it be nice if we could actually use words for what they mean? This is an old song and dance though. Language is fluid and the term atheism is BOUND to be lost to bad translation; if the current progress is any indicator. Before long the word will have changed meaning so drastically that I will stop calling myself atheist and start calling myself something else... skeptic or something. Maybe, who knows.

But the language issue, while I think it is important to mention, is hardly what is important.

As far as his pandering to the people buying tickets, I can't say I blame him. What is Richard Harris' primary platform if not "we should be able to question religion like any other philosophy". To me, that also sounds like one of the major points Bill Maher would make.Now I will grant you that he also (Richard Harris as well) takes a hard anti-theist stance. I would attribute this more to picking ones battles. Sure, they're kind of pussy-footing around but I don't think it hinders their cause or damage their reputation as atheists.

This is the same argument I make when people accuse RRS of being to "harsh" and "in your face". Not everyone fights the fight the same way. I'm glad there are the cool and collected Richard Harris out there. There needs to be that kind of representation. But I am also thrilled that there are "no holds barred" atheists out there like RRS really willing to mix it up. We need both, I would say.

On the OP subject of how Bill Maher considers the word Atheism, I found this:

Interviewer: "But tell me, 16% you said, of Americans, don't claim to believe in a God?

Bill Maher: "That's right, would call themselves atheists or agnostics, terms I don't like because they have a pejorative meaning now. I just call people rationalists, who don't believe in (crazy stuff*) "

And he goes on to say later: "The United States congress has 535 members; there's not one atheist. We're not represented"

which sounds to me an awful lot like he considers himself an atheist. He just doesn't like the term because it has a pejorative meaning.

So there... It's basically just because he wants to be heard and respected by people before they ignore his movie because they think he's an atheist.

I don't see a problem with this. It's just a word after all. There are other words (like Maher's own preference: rationalist) that convey the same sense to me.

You should watch the whole interview to get a full sense of where he's coming from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SeN2q3bA2xQ

* I think that's what he says, but I can't hear it clearly

He can call himself anything he wants, just as long as it's not fundamentalist Christian. 

I just saw Religulous last night and let me tell you Bill Maher is into the “endmeme” big time. At the end of the movie he posted some really scary scenes of Christian and Islamic membots armed, hooded and ready to destroy the world for God.  For more on this subject check out my video on Youtube, http://www.youtube.com/results?uploaded=d&search_query=endmeme or search on “endmeme”. It’s not McCain I’m worried about, it’s Sarah Palin who’s severely and dangerously infected. We can’t let it happen. We can’t let religious people cause more damage than they have already. Pass on the video to friends if you agree. Rich