Let's have a contest [Archive] - Christian Recovery Forums

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profnachos

07-10-2006, 11:19 PM

I tried to engage a fundamentalist blogger (yeah, there I go again) whose full time job is attacking all things outside of fundamentalism.

Why do I do this? Voyager made an excellent observation below. You can leave fundamentalism, but fundamentalism won't leave you. It is akin to what my Hispanic friends have told me. You can leave the barrio, but you can't take the barrio out of you.

I am still tempted to think I missed out on what fundamentalism really has to offer. It seems to work for a lot of people*, so how about me? I know. It defies logic. Think of my addiction to fundamentalist blogs as addictions to alcohol, porn, etc, and you will see the similarities. :eek:

Okay, so I tried to engage this blogger, but he flat out refused to do so. Why give a voice to every movement, he says? Just because he attacks a group of Christans called X, that does not translate into his obligation to give them a "voice." He won't give Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons a voice, and he refuses to discuss with me as well.

(Scripture warning)
Equating me with the Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons. Great. Then I thought about giving this verse to him from Proverbs 18:2

Fool finds no pleasure in understanding, but delights in airing his own opinions.

But I decided not to. I already know what his response will be.

Here is the contest. What kind of response do you think I have in mind? Because of the utter predictability of fundamentalism, we should all have the same answer. But if you come up with an even better one, I will stand corrected, and I shall forever esteem you.

* During my first preview of this post, this sentense read, "It seems to work a lot of people." I forgot the word "for" between work and a lot. But then, I am thinking that I was speaking the truth when I wrote fundamentalism WORKS a lot of people, not works for.:D :D.

Voyager

07-10-2006, 11:56 PM

You can leave fundamentalism, but fundamentalism won't leave you.
Addenum: Not unless you evict it yourself... and it doesn't happen overnight. It's a lifelong process.

:cool:

Zoe

07-11-2006, 05:48 AM

Hi Profnachos,

A little confused. What is the contest?

Willow

07-11-2006, 06:25 AM

Hey Prof... do you have a concrete question we can answer?

dougjb

07-11-2006, 07:05 AM

Hi Profanchos,
You quoted proverbs 18:2, "Fools find no pleasure in understanding, but delights in airing his opinions." There is another verse you could use when talking with the fundamentalist, which is Proverbs 18:13, "He who answers before listening -- that is his folly and his shame."
If the fundamentalist claims to be Biblical, then he must truly listen and understand your position or he is not following his own profession of conforming to Scripture. Granted, this is just one small thing you could do to encourage them to engage in real and honest communication. Maybe this could be helpful.

Just some food for thought.:D
Dougjb

Illuminated

07-11-2006, 08:35 AM

Here is the contest. What kind of response do you think I have in mind? Because of the utter predictability of fundamentalism, we should all have the same answer. But if you come up with an even better one, I will stand corrected, and I shall forever esteem you.I guess your response would depend on what you are trying to achieve by communicating with the buffoon - oops - I mean blogger.

If you wanted to continue with the fundy technique of throwing scritpure at some one, you could indeed use your suggested scripture.

If you were really ticked off and wanted to express your anger at him for refusing to give you air time on his blog, you could retort with something like: Aha! I now understand that your blog is simply your soapbox, and heaven forbid that you respond to your imaginary crowd that you perceive is standing around listening.

If you wanted to respond in a way that would describe your (my) impression of him, you could write: Thanks for letting me know the policies on your blog. I will certainly waste no more time trying to have a dialogue with you.

I can think of some more really tacky responses, but, why waste the effort? :D .

profnachos

07-11-2006, 10:12 AM

Carmen

07-11-2006, 01:11 PM

If he doesn't want to discuss, that kind of takes the air out of the balloon. A fool would ignore sound advice too, doesn't Proverbs say somewhere not to discuss things with fools? Do a concordance search on fools. My favorite online source:http://www.ibs.org/niv/, practical, easy to set parameters, quick.

What about throwing pearls to swine? I gave up on stuff like that a while ago. They won't come to their senses until they run into a brick wall like I did, someone more fundie and nasty than themselves. Only then will they start even thinking about going in another direction. I was there, I know. Knocking hand on the side of my head as if to get water out of my ear - I still haven't got all the fundie stuff out of there yet...it sticks like tar, more poisonous too. Ugh!

little lamb

07-11-2006, 08:04 PM

Okay, so I was not very clear on what the contest was about. Sorry.

The question is, what would be a fundamentalist response if I quoted the following verse from Proverbs?

Fool finds no pleasure in understanding, but delights in airing his own opinions.

Given the utter predictability of fundamentalists, I think we all know the answer. I am wondering if you are thinking what I am thinking.

Well, i don't know the answer, but here are some of my guesses of possible responses:

A. no response. (it's obvious you don't want to learn, so why waste time arguing
with you?)

B. clearly this applies to you. It's clear that you aren't interested in understanding, but only in airing your own opinions.

I had a third one, but i forgot it when i got interrupted.

Illuminated

07-11-2006, 08:09 PM

I am wondering if you are thinking what I am thinking.Since I am not from a fundamentalist background, I'll take a wild guess:

"I'll pray for you!!!!"

Take what works :D and leave the rest!