Be prepared... to give heathens a badge: UK Scouts open doors to unbelievers

They should have stayed Christian only at least in principle - it kept out the riff raff.

Recent imports can join the Jihad corps, etc. where they will likely feel more at home:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/7121945/Police-warn-of-Jihad-training-for-children.html

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

--"Atheism is a religion thats core tenet is that "There is no God" this is a belief as it cannot be scientifically proved."--

As Ricky Gervais once said, saying that not believing in God is a religion is like saying that not skiing is a hobby. "Actually it's my favourite hobby, I do it everyday".

Not believing in something for which there is no evidence, and believing in something for which there is no evidence.... please don't try to pretend these are equivalent. They are not.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

> Atheism is a religion thats core tenet is that "There is no God" this is a belief as it cannot be scientifically proved.

No, I'd argue that "Atheism" is no more a religion than "Theism" or "Deism" are. It is certainly a belief, but "religion" implies a level of organisation, custom and dogma.

> The scouts are allowing all religious beliefs, the Guides have come down on the side of one religion that cannot tolerate any other belief but their own (Atheism).

What? You mean Guides swear an oath that there is no God or gods? I suspect not. I was under the impression that they just didn't mention religion - just as the Scouts are planning to do.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"...the Guides have gone for a policy where the minority imposes its will upon the majority, the Scouts have been truly inclusive"

Try looking at it from a different direction. Not referencing any god at all isn't imposing their will on others, it just means they don't care what god (if any) you believe in. I can virtually guarantee that however many different versions of the scout vow there may be, someone somewhere will be excluded as they will have missed some minor religious sect. And who decides what the "valid" religions are that they will have a version of the vow for?

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

idiot.

It is an absence of belief.

What you are saying makes as much sence as adding cold or degrees kelvin

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

Incorrect. The word "Atheism" just like "Asexual" is simply two words mushed together.

The word literally and ONLY means lack of theism. It has no other meaning or connotation.

It cannot be a religion. That would be literally exactly the same as saying because you don't believe in purple monsters that live under your bed, you are an anti-purple monster fanatic.

Simply not true. You simply don't believe in them because there is no reason to do so.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

You have a total misunderstanding of the difference between agnostic and atheist. Agnosticism is the belief that the existence of God is fundamentally unknowable; it was largely invented by Thomas Henry Huxley. Probably because at the time, atheism was considered equivalent to satanism, and liable to get you in deep trouble.

An atheist can be absolutely sure that there is no god, or think that there probably isn't one, or just vaguely inclined to believe that there isn't one. It's not a religion because it lacks all the characteristics of one; the idea that anything that cannot be scientifically proven is a religion is silly. You cannot prove that there is not a invisible pink elephant sitting behind you at the moment, nor the non-existence of the Lock Ness monster. Do you consider you believe in the absence of the elephant to be a religion? I think God doesn't exist for the similar reasons -- first no one can make up their mind what "god" means anyway and second there is little evidence. Call this belief if you will, but it's belief in the same way that I believe the sun will rise tomorrow.

Finally, 59% Christian is really not the same thing as saying 59% believe in the Christian god; the census doesn't define what is meant by "Christian". As the old Northern Ireland gag goes "but are you a catholic atheist, or a protestant atheist".

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"The Guides have gone for a blanket ban on God...

[...]

"The scouts are allowing all religious beliefs, the Guides have come down on the side of one religion that cannot tolerate any other belief but their own (Atheism).

To leap from the Girl Guides having an initiation ceremony which don't directly reference religion to an institutionalized intolerance of religion on their part is a feat of logical gymnastics which both impresses and terrifies me.

If you have any evidence of the GG excluding anyone on the grounds of religious faith then there are any number of newspapers who'd be delighted to hear from you as I imagine would various statutory bodies - if you've got it then it's your public duty to produce it, if you haven't then it's my public duty to point at you and laugh...

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"The scouts have different promises for different groups so Christians, Muslims...etc each have a different promise."

And there is the problem. They don't need any promise to any mythical being. May as well promise to Harry Potter!

Also, it is perfectly possible to be "Agnostic Atheist" right through to "Anti-theist". Atheism is not a religion, it's basing a decision based of the evidence to hand. I can't prove there isn't a teapot in orbit around Mars, but I am not agnostic on the matter.

Without brain-washing, atheism is the default position of any educated person. And by "educated" I mean actually educated with and understanding of critical thought and the scientific method.

Painting agnostics as wishy-washy

'Don't forget that agnosticism is honest because it says "we don't know if there is a God or if there isn't".'

That's a wishy-washy interpretation of agnosticism. A better interpretation of agnosticism would be, 'I see no solid evidence for a god so I don't believe in one.'

The 'don't know' part of agnosticism doesn't mean it's a 50-50 thing. I don't know for sure that the sun will rise in the east tomorrow, but evidence and reason tells me it will.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"....the Guides have gone for a policy where the minority imposes its will upon the majority,"

Er No! Making someone do something is imposing your will.

By not doing something they aren't imposing anything on anyone.

No one is preventng any Girl Guide or boy Scout making a promise to God. Just not as a compulsory part of the Promise

Apart from which, the 59% Christian figure isn't actually referring to active belief, but purely identity. How many of these 59% ever set foot in a church? And It was the parents who were asked, not the kids.

In fact the promise only ever referred to God, not just the Christian god, anyway,

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

I think you misunderstand the difference between not swearing by a God and swearing against a God.

In any case, as disputes over infant and adult baptism show, one might question whether a particular child understands an oath or affirmation, without challenging the existence of a God.

What I see is something God-neutral. The new phrase for Guiding is "To be true to myself and develop my beliefs," and I just cannot see how that can be claimed to be a denial of any God. It covers those who believe in a God and, coupled with the rest of the Promise, covers both what and why somebody makes the choices they do.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"Atheism is a religion thats core tenet is that "There is no God" this is a belief as it cannot be scientifically proved."

"Atheism is a religion..."

And that's where you lost your credibility I'm afraid.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"Given that the last Census shows that 59% of the country is Christian"

I was raised CofE. I very much DO NOT believe, and after debacle following debacle, I don't want to know.

However, that is the box that I tick as there is nothing else that comes close to describing what I think, and the other categories apply even less.

Before you say that so many people are Christian, let's start with - how many actually go to church?

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

"The scouts are allowing all religious beliefs, the Guides have come down on the side of one religion that cannot tolerate any other belief but their own (Atheism)."

The Guides are not atheist, they're secular. There is not-so-subtle difference and it's kind of important you understand it if you want to contribute sensibly to such discussions!

The Brownie/Guide promise reads thusly:

I promise that I will do my best;

To be true to myself and develop my beliefs,

To serve the Queen and my community,

To help other people and

To keep the (Brownie) Guide Law.

Not including overtly religious statements in a promise does not imply Atheism. If I run a community youth scheme that does not involve the local church that doesn't make it an atheist scheme, it just doesn't happen to involve religion - not everything has to!

The Guides aren't swearing off religion and making declarations of atheism, they just decided not to swear a promise to God (and then have to provide alternatives to whatever God is called in your particular book). That doesn't make it atheistic. Secular, but not atheist.

That said, well done the Scouts. Now people like me don't have to lie during their leader interview.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

Anonymous Coward @07:23 is of course correct that atheism and religion are more or less the same.

It has been estimated that there are 3000 distinct religions being practised on this planet. The atheist believes that all 3000 of them are wrong. The religious person believes that 2999 of them are wrong. The beliefs of the religious person and the atheist are identical to 3 places of decimals.

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

[quote]Given that the last Census shows that 59% of the country is Christian[/quote]

...given a census with the following multiple guess options:

1. Christian good next door neighbour

2. Mujahideen terrorist*

3. Om chanting unwashed hippy*

4. Atheism is not a religion, we'll just put you down as Christian

5. Something else*

*by selecting this option you give permission for jackbooted police to kick down your door

Re: Nice to see them catch up with the girls

Most people I know who identify as "Christian" do so by default, and have been in church less than I have in the past 10 years. I'm politely described as "Apostate Catholic", or Atheist. Al

As for removing Relgion totally, that's rubbish. They changed "Love My God" to "to be true to myself and develop my beliefs". Which allows ALL religions or none depending on the person. It's far more inclusive than before, and it IS about time the scouts caught up.

Also as you skirted round, Science cannot prove something doesn't exist. In fact scientists will tell you they can't prove anything beyond doubt. I don't think god exists, because I've seen no proof. I can however look at the evidence for the theories of Evolution and The Big Bang and say that is a fact. I mean, Gravity is only a theory, and nobody argues with that.