Anti-theistic strawmen?

It's the idea that some irrational faith-based beliefs are supposed to have some sort of protected status.

First off, I never claimed the Bible talks about Santa.

Buz will reject the comparison because he is anti-skeptical BECAUSE of his religion.

Was it Dawkins that said something like, "Most people are atheists with respect to all the other gods who have existed, some just go 1 god further"?

Comparing the God of Abraham to Zeus, Apollo, Thor, Santa Clause, the Tooth Fairy, etc is not a good argument simply because there are vastly different reasons for why people reject those figures.

Jazzns previously writes:Buz will likely dismiss a comparison between Santa and God BECAUSE the Bible says so.

How can the Bible refute Santa Claus when he's a saint of the Catholic Church? You seem to have completely ignored that point.
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The Bible doesn't have anything to do with it. How could it? Santa Claus is a saint of the Catholic Church.

Nonetheless, he's going to reject Santa Claus for precisely the same reason I reject his god. Case closed.

Is a far cry from saying that the Bible talks about Santa Clause.

Forget about Santa Clause. It is just an example.

My broader point is about rejection of OTHER dogma because the religion says so. Not because it is rational to do so.

Is what I am saying that contentious?

Have you ever actually seen Christians argue with members of other religions? Even they know that an argument like "your religion is wrong because mine says so" is pretty intellectually unfulfilling. Pop around a few apologetics websites and you can see how it goes down. Arguments from Scripture are fairly rare, except for the argument that goes "the Bible is better than your holy book because of more fulfilled prophecy" etc, because even a Christian can put themselves in another person's shoes and understand that an argument based on the assumed inerrancy of another religion's holy text isn't likely to be compelling.

It's just not true, Jazzns. That's not at all how other people defend themselves against other religions. That's not at all how they argue about it. Even the deeply religious see that, in order to proselytize, they need more than circular reasoning. "Because the Pope said so" is an argument that is only convincing once you're a Catholic. Even the Catholics understand that. They're not idiots.

Christians DO frequently source the innerancy of the Bible as a justification for existence of God.

It may be true that in a case of proselytizing they might try to "ease" a person into religion by way of psudo-objective reasoning.

True or False, they are rejecting the comparison base on rational reasons.

Where does that come from?

Ringo:If there are theists with a childish version of theism, how that a strawman?

Modulous:Normally he raises the issue with a different point in mind. For example, showing that our morality is far divorced from the morality taught in the Old Testament. Other times, he is putting it out there, because some people - 'on the fence' Christians included, aren't aware of these stories. As for being the 'best' that religion has to offer, I've not seen him say that kind of thing, could you drag up a source?

He states up front that if your brand of theology is metaphorical wishy-washy stuff that makes no particular claims other than subjective theobabble, then he isn't really arguing against that because it would be futile to do so.

Dawkins writes:Pat Robertson would be harmless comedy, were he less typical of those who today hold power and influence in the United States. In the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the Noah equivalent, chosen to be spared with his family because he was uniquely righteous, was Abraham's nephew Lot. Two male angels were sent to Sodom to warn Lot to leave the city before the brimstone arrived. Lot hospitably welcomed the angels into his house, whereupon all the men of Sodom gathered around and demanded that Lot should hand the angels over so that they could (what else?) sodomize them: 'Where are the men which came in to thee this night? Bring them out unto us, that we may know them' (Genesis 19: 5).Yes, 'know' has the Authorized Version's usual euphemistic meaning, which is very funny in the context. Lot's gallantry in refusing the demand suggests that God might have been onto something when he singled him out as the only good man in Sodom. But Lot's halo is tarnished by the terms of his refusal: 'I pray you, brethren, do not so wickedly. Behold now, I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is good in your eyes: only unto these men do nothing; for therefore came they under the shadow of my roof' (Genesis 19: 7-8).Whatever else this strange story might mean, it surely tells us something about the respect accorded to women in this intensely religious culture. As it happened, Lot's bargaining away of his daughters' virginity proved unnecessary, for the angels succeeded in repelling the marauders by miraculously striking them blind. They then warned Lot to decamp immediately with his family and his animals, because the city was about to be destroyed. The whole household escaped, with the exception of Lot's unfortunate wife, whom the Lord turned into a pillar of salt because she committed the offence - comparatively mild, one might have thought - of looking over her shoulder at the fireworks display.Lot's two daughters make a brief reappearance in the story. After their mother was turned into a pillar of salt, they lived with their father in a cave up a mountain. Starved of male company, they decided to make their father drunk and copulate with him. Lot was beyond noticing when his elder daughter arrived in his bed or when she left, but he was not too drunk to impregnate her. The next night the two daughters agreed it was the younger one's turn. Again Lot was too drunk to notice, and he impregnated her too (Genesis 19: 31-6). If this dysfunctional family was the best Sodom had to offer by way of morals, some might begin to feel a certain sympathy with God and his judicial brimstone.

Take that, Mr Buddha.

Crashfrog:The theology that Dawkins' critics often refer to, the one they say he's ignoring, is less developed than the rigid, explicit dogma of the fundamentalists.

Modulous:That's an exerpt from Chapter 7, not being held up as the best example of theology here

Modulous:Although many modern Buddhists are in the wishy-washy category, they haven't always been so.

Archer Opterix writes:It's a strawman if one takes a childish version of an idea as the definitive and comprehensive representation...

... of an idea that includes far more than this....

The same thing is at work when creos attack a scientific idea as misunderstood or misrepresented by popular journalists rather than as defined by scientists.