Not trying to start shit, I'm genuinely curious as to how someone could possibly believe in this.(I'm picking out Christians specifically because of its popularity in North America)

I can start with my reasoning for what I believe.

I believe in evolution simply because it makes sense to me, I'd drop it instantly if another theory made more sense. Just looking at how different things adapt to different conditions is proof enough for me, how come an animal in one country has different teeth then the same animal in another country? Simple, it's evolved into a more effective form for its environment.

As far as religion goes, people believe in it for a few reasons as far as I can tell.

1. They've been told

When your parents and other people in your community tell you something is true your whole life, you WILL believe it. Humans are social creatures, we're wired to stick with the pack and do things the way others do. If everyone around me had said that Jack and the Beanstock was a real story my entire life, I would probably believe it.

2. They want to find it

These people are "seekers". You know the type, those that have a need to know answers. The problem here, is that if you WANT to find something, you will. Go watch T.V, and purposely look for something, racism perhaps. You'll find a LOT, because in the act of searching for something, your mind will alter your perception and you WILL find it.

This wouldn't bother me so much if the reason for belief wasn't built on constant threats. Children being show images of the devil ripping people's hearts out, the constant guilt of every sin supposedly adding to the weight Jesus carries. Everything about it is not only evil in method, but corrupt and contradictory.

The way it's set up is a win win for "god". When someone has something terrible happen in their life, they'd think "why would god allow this to happen?" and faith wavers quite quickly. In jumps the answer: " It's all in god's plan".

It's like having someone tell you to give them 1000 dollars, and in just a few days, you'll receive a million! These answers are the type that a con artist uses to take advantage of gullible people, if that's the best an all knowing, almighty god can do, I'm seriously disappointed.

As far as answering prayers, well there's 3 answers: Yes, No, and Wait. Pray to win money, if you do, god did it, if you don't, god didn't want you to, and WAIT is the truly devious one. If you believe in something granting free wishes, you'd eventually get tired of always being told no (again, a faith breaker). The wait option is yet another faith keeper, in this way, no is almost never an answer, because you're told god may answer your prayer SOMEDAY.

If we're made in god's image, god must be an egotistical asshole as well.

In case you haven't guessed, I actually bothered to post this because of all of the shit evolution has been getting by the religious idiots lately(Christine O'Donnell, Glenn Beck etc). It blows my mind that they can accuse evolution of having no proof (when in fact it does) when their own beliefs exist purely because they've been told god exists, and have no other backing at all.

So I'm curious, why do you believe what you believe?

Things are steadily progressing into an image that Americans will have a tough time shaking off.

I feel sorry for the Muslims of the world, they've all been painted with the same brush as the terrorists, and are now so easily identified as the enemy. It isn't just the Ground Zero mosque, but all over the United States we have people threatening and sometimes outright assaulting Muslims. These people "terrorize" others that they accuse of being "terrorists", the irony is truly fantastic.

If you tried to take away guns from the citizens, there would be a complete uproar and constant quoting of the rights that the constitution, and more specifically, the second amendment grants. Yet when an unpopular religion builds a place of worship, the whole "Freedom of Religion" part of the first amendment seems to be missing.

"You can build a mosque at ground zero when we can build a synagogue in Mecca" is one of the worst excuses I've ever heard. Last time I checked, Saudi Arabia doesn't advertise itself as a country that grants the rights to practice any religion you want, the United States however, does.

It's not about sensitivity to those that died, Muslims died on that day too, and to assume the person next to you is a terrorist because they wear a headscarf is insane.

I realize not all Americans are like this, in fact, the majority probably aren't. Many of us are also guilty of painting the Americans with the "stupid and ignorant" brush. I just hope that this issue will be resolved in such a way that the rest of the world knows that the Americans really will practice what they preach.

Don't even get me started on those that want the 14th amendment repealed...

Basil Marceaux.

Please, please, please, tell me this is a joke.

Does the number of Facebook friends you have matter to you? Why?

Every couple of weeks I get double digit amounts of friend requests from people who I've never met. Sometimes only because they have a couple of friends in common, and some that don't even live in the same damn country as me!

I look through my friends profiles and see numbers that are approaching 1000, and they say they talk to all of these so called "friends". No, you don't, half of them have probably never even met you.

With Facebook and Twitter, everyone somehow gets into a state of mind where they think that everyone cares what they're doing, and that whoever has more Facebook friends really has more friends.

Maybe that's just the way we all are. If you've noticed, I'm being quite hypocritical by ragging on Twitter, yet I'm expressing a pointless opinion 99% of you won't give a shit about anyway. Funny how that works huh?

It seems like every damn time I'm on the internet, I'm arguing with someone.

Sometimes it's someone who doesn't know the difference between "your" and "you're".

Someone who, instead of making valid points to support their argument, just falls back on pointless insults instead.

Someone who won't believe that there is such a thing as subjective morality, and is blind to the other side of things.

The list goes on and on.

Is it just a bad representation I'm getting because of the anonymity factor? Is it just laziness? Or are people really as stupid as they seem?