while walking across campus i saw a big circle of people gathered around this fundamentalist christian guy who was "preaching." i don't think any of the people were with the guy, there to hear him speak, they just stopped walking like me because it's interesting. there were a lot of loud kind of annoying people (because they'd try to be clever/funny and fail) who would shout out questions to him and then he'd dance around the answers and then someone else would have a question/criticism. there was a muslim guy arguing with him about certain verses in the bible, and how he knew jesus was the way, but muhammed wasn't. there was a gay jewish kid who went to hug him, but the guy held out his bible and refused, and said the kid was wrong for not accepting jesus christ as the savior.

i watched this for a good 30 minutes. another on campus christian group, one less ehh...enthusiastic towards trying to convert people, passed out popsicles while all this was going on. a lot of good questions were raised in the midst of people trying to look cool in front of their friends, but ultimately nothing was accomplished. the guy didn't convert anybody in the crowd all afternoon, i'd bet. and i don't think his faith was damaged at all by what some biology students were shouting at him, or what an evil muslim said to him.

walking back, i thought of this forum, and how it's so similar, yet looks more ordered because it's all typed out and people can't cut each other off. (heh, at one point a kid went into a big tirade about evolution, while the guy read a scripture and they just screamed over each other). still, nothing really gets accomplished here.

i wonder if there's a way to fix that.

i wonder if there's a way to fix that.

Maybe. But it wouldn't happen unless everyone made the decision to change by their own will.

I wouldn't worry about it. If others want to fight it out, let them.

what an evil muslim said to him.

lol, why was the muslim evil?..What did he say, for you to consider him to be evil?

it wasn't this guy was it?
http://i32.tinypic.com/wmcdnp.jpg

We've got one of theses guys where I go to school at.

As for fixing the problem, people need to learn that they are going to disagree. A lot of the loud and annoying stuff is just to get your attention.
The problem is that everyone's emotions get running when they get presented with something they strongly disagree with, then it just goes on from there.

We have a guy to that comes around campus every fall. He's a pastor and professor that was a hippie back in the day. He said he realized Christ is the way when he was worshipping the sunset one night and felt since there is more in the universe besides the sun then Christ is the way. I was all 'lolwut?'. He's pretty fundamentalist/brainwashed. He dances around apparent contradictions and inanity in his belief.

I love people that do that. They've got something a lot of people lack today: faith and balls.

respect

Yes! Faith and balls. (http://www.waronline.org/terror/suicide/parade.jpg)

lol, why was the muslim evil?..What did he say, for you to consider him to be evil?

i was just being sarcastic. his arguments were actually more refreshing than most of the kids there, because they were all atheists, so it was easy for the christian guy to dismiss them.

a different guy was doing the same thing today, but i had class and slept in late. it's this on-campus christian group that puts these discussion things on. funny, they're the same people that provided students with free tickets to go see ben stein's movie, "expelled," which tries to distance itself and intelligent design from religion.

though the guy yesterday specifically said he was a creationist, believed the earth was several thousand years old, and said there was scientific evidence of the great flood because every culture has a record of some great flood occuring and the earth's soil is layered or some b.s.

i wanted to ask him about mormons. and about why there is no record of the israelite's exodus occurring anywhere outside of the bible. but i don't think i'd get a good answer, so meh.

not quite the same, see, they're all part of a group that has a single minded mission whereas in this case, there is a single person speaking to many people. and these people are not exactly accepting.

I'm sure there are sucide bombers that have acted alone.

The point is, suicide bombing in the name of Allah requires both faith and balls. A deadly combination. Literally.

Hardly the things to be praising.

George Bush should take note of that.

Imagine when the U.S.-version of the suicide bombers start to hit Iran :).