Christian Tries to Control the Narrative

[insanetubegain]

Even if the God of Abraham can be shown to be real, according to the Bible it's a horrible monster I would never willingly worship.

[invisiblegorilla]

Appreciate y'all taking the time to walk through this video and being open enough to call bullshit when you see it. It's been very helpful with myself, personally, to listen to your opinions and make my own decisions regarding how to approach this type of media.

[kamilgregor]

I think the aliens hypothesis can be used as an empathy exercise. Someone says Jesus was an alien. Use all of your mental resources to really appreciate how nuts that sounds. That's how I feel when someone says he was raised from the dead.

[invisiblegorilla]

For a long time, the entire reason that I was 'there, waiting to be convinced', or 'wanting to have a conversation', was because I was sincerely trying to keep my Christian faith in tact. I don't know whether Braxton realizes this or not, but for a lot of ex-Christians, there is a TON of reasons to want to stay in the fold, to want it to be true, to cling on to what has been a great comfort in your life. Deconstruction and walking away from the faith was very painful and scary for me. In some ways it still is.

[MocknozzieRiver]

Rhett and Link were one of the biggest pushes for me to leave Christianity.

[harrycooper]

Damn, you guys are good, very impressive arguments. Keep up the good work!

[MultiCappie]

Braxton, your team has had 2, 000 years to provide one example of evidence. Do you really not get that?

[kamilgregor]

The problem with evidences like paring an ocean in Jesus' name is that it'd still be underdetermined - how would you rule out Islam being true and the parting being a deception of Shaitan? If I'm still not convinced, that's not s problem with me, that's a problem with theistic explanations.

[hank_says_things]

My first experience of Braxton was his 10 Questions for Atheists video, in which he preempted most questions with his expected answers, and his responses to them, and generally well-poisoned and generalised his way down the list. That and his subsequent activity makes it clear he’s not at all interested in appealing to atheists, instead he’s using his engagements with atheists as props while he cheerleads to the home crowd. You’ll notice he’s always aiming his rhetoric at Christians, even when he says he’s directly addressing atheists.

It’s a disingenuous ploy, but very common among apologists: arm the wannabe evangelists in your flock with dud ammo, and when they come back full of holes, give them more - and always make sure to accuse the enemy of not fighting fair.

Braxton and those like him know their arguments don’t work on atheists, because most of us come from religious backgrounds - but he also knows his flock don’t know that.

Braxton’s goal isn’t converting atheists - it’s retaining customers.

Call me cynical, but I’ve been watching this “great” debate for fifteen years and the goal has never changed - neither do the arguments or tactics, for the most part. Apologists evangelise to evangelicals so they won’t leave the faith - they know that happens far more often than the reverse.

Edit: woah. his disclaimer at the end was the purest fricking well-poison I have EVER heard. Just…wow.

[bobjoe]

It's amazing that Christians can make up outlandish scenarios that never happen like writing on the moon, but their own book says they can tell mountains to jump into the ocean and I don't seem to recall any mountains jumping into the ocean. Seems to me like that would be great evidence for Christianity.

[goldenalt]

God is an alien. He's not from earth.

[JamesFodor]

So was V actually sent as a temptress by Satan? Asking for a friend...

[VaughanMcCue]

This was like the perfect trinity to confront trinny visual radio and like braxi in particular. The presenters inserted *like* three times into every thought group of sentences. Just the same, I 'liked', enjoyed and got a load of good ideas from this session and played it three times because there is a lot of good material here to consider.

[vikingmusings]

its a shame to see Braxton just care about recruitment and not was is factually the case. In fact if you have one thing that will convince you god is real that is gullibility right there. Should always have a higher standard then one thing happening.

[oftenincorrect]

Braxton lists a few reasons atheists often give for not believing in God, and sites incoherence among them. Then he criticizes atheist who don’t know what it would take to change their minds. How is someone who believes that a concept is incoherent supposed to know what it would take to convince them that it exists?

[joshhoward]

I think Braxton sometimes brings up good critiques of certain atheistic positions or attitudes but his videos would be much more palatable to watch if he would just not play into emotions so much and apply a little bit of skepticism toward his own position now and then.

[DSW-imcj]

Thank you for this vid, i agreed with so much and it was helpful. Sorry i hope I’m not annoying with my long comment Your just so honest, kind and approachable. I’m going threw deconstruction myself though I’m a plain theist (thinking about becoming christian), but I really want an ex christian to talk to before I decide to do so so I can be well informed and challenged on my views; but I get a lot of those hurtful talk from Atheists/Christians like you guys mentioned in the vid and it’s painful & depressing. I feel like there’s no one on ether side I can talk to and my life is already very stressful, I really want to be challenged so I can think correctly but I don’t wanna be hurt anymore then I am already. I’ve been on ex groups like ex christian.com but I found no welcoming, understandably so cause they thought I was there to convert but I just wanted support. Is there any ex christian groups I can join that can help me with my questions, concerns, doubts? Are any of you guys available for email, etc?

[joebarnard]

I first came across Braxton when Shannon Q interviewed him. She gave him every benefit and framed him as a rational Christian willing to have productive conversations. That approach is one of the things that makes Shannon awesome.

Since then I have found Braxton either intellectually deficient or in the intellectual dishonesty hall of fame.

I kinda get it. Indoctrination does this to people.

[MultiCappie]

I really don't get this "how would you explain this completely ridiculous impossibility *if it happened?"* form of apologism. I think it's just designed to waste our time.