Better Than Religion – Détails, épisodes et analyse

I recently came across a new apologist channel, just a couple of months older than this channel. Our new friend seems an earnest fellow; will his arguments be fresh and new as well? Not exactly, though the way he presents them leads us down some surprising new turns.  Support Atheist and pro-science content on this channel: BetterThanReligion.com

We found his channel! The "hate preacher" from a previous video is a real pastor, with a real channel, and we tracked him down.  

In what was the official promo trailer at the time (it's since been demoted to the ranks of regular videos), we get to see what Pastor David Lynn is all about in a whole new light - and that light is victim blaming.  

See how far PD will go to get a rare win - and a sterling example of how absolutely disgusting Christianity can be.  

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Ember takes on multiple religious apologists, anti-science agents, and transphobes, rapid-fire style!

Many people today say "The Big Bang wasn't witnessed and can't be repeated, so it isn't science." The truth is the singularity event isn't a hypothesis itself, but a conclusion drawn from dozens and dozens of other testable experiments and repeatable observations. It's a model of the universe built on a mountain of facts. That said, the theory does make unique, specific predictions that can observed, verified, and repeatably tested in their own right - including the first light from the dawn of time that you can still observe yourself today.   

If you truly believe that the theory is bunk, I invite you to come along and see for yourself how it was conceptualized, what data supports it, and what tests and observations can still be repeated even today.

Matt Powell does intellectual battle with the flimsiest straw man ever constructed, and still manages to lose. Yet, like the proverbial pigeon playing chess, he struts around the board as if he'd won.  I hadn't intended to revisit Matt so soon, but this video was so packed full of fail, I simply couldn't resist. Come along as we watch Matt get caught stealing, get caught lying (again), even accidentally call himself Satan. Plus: lots of science! That has nothing to do with atheism, but Matt insists on making a fool of himself about it, and it sure is fun to watch.

Daniel, the "Muslim Skeptic," lost a debate to atheist Aron Ra. Now he thinks a rumor he heard on the Internet retroactively proves him right.   

Fun fact: believing something extraordinary without any critical consideration simply because it seems to support your preconceptions is the opposite of skepticism - but it IS exactly what religion conditions the mind to do. One of the many reasons humanity can do better than religion.

In a polarized world, finding common ground with your intellectual antagonists isn't easy. But here's a thing: we're all humans, and we all do human things. It's important to keep that in mind when dealing with others, and for our own well-being.  In this video, Ember reviews Cameron's 12 tips for apologists, and looks at how those ideas can be good advice for all of us.

An unnamed believer puts forth the idea that atheism is super easy to defeat: all you have to do is deflect every question we ask!  It's exactly as ridiculous as it sounds. But fun! Even better: the bad-faith question he uses to do it is reversible!  Ember, in turn, poses an actual question for theists.

Is bigotry the default setting for the United States? Can it survive, if people are allowed to "exist" without constant hate? If it can't, does it really deserve to?  Ben Shapiro argues, at times coherently, that the new Respect For Marriage Act marks the beginning of the end, and that by allowing all people equal rights to marry, it will mean the fall of all churches, all morals, all social values, and every government. The assumption is that since conservative, religious "values" are so deeply ingrained in American culture and its institutions, it is impossible for them to ever change to accommodate such an unreasonable things as "equality." So it'll all come tumbling down - just like it did when all races got the right to vote, and when women got the right to vote, and when slavery was ended, and so on.  Because it's more important to protect religion, and peoples' rights to harm other people, than to protect people from being harmed, apparently.

What is compassion? Most of us might say: empathy, understanding, wanting to help. Matt seems to think it means telling you to get back in line, and do as you're told, because your well-being doesn't matter. He goes on to equivocate about the meaning of acceptance, and how hurt he feels when we trans folk and allies call him out for saying hurtful things, rejecting our agency, and demanding we be who he thinks we should be, rather than who we are.  All of this is case in point for why I'm here, and why all of us need to stand up to the cultural bully that is fundamentalist Christianity. There are people who believe like Matt does who hold real law-making power, and they're doing real damage. Pushing back on the beliefs at the core of that kind of bigotry is the best and only way to effectively limit their power to harm everyone, us included.