...
Really, you're just bored and in need of a cause and don't have a clue what's wrong with the world beyond those in it who irritate you. I speak with some authority here and am as repulsed by conservatives as I take you to be. But there's a qualitative difference between rebelling against authority for the sake of it, like an arrant teenager, and rebelling aspirationally and constructively, and that's why I wanted to get some idea of your vision.
Religion is not the problem, it's a symptom, and all you're saying is you support the disease but you hate the warts.
Has it occurred to you that your cause on tax reform is in sync with a neoliberal agenda (at least fiscally)?

<In short, I want my children to go to school without interference from preachers, to be able to marry whom they wish, and to have sovereignty over their reproductive biology>

Respectively:
All teaching is preaching.
Why do they need the institution?
Sovereignty--no accountability--tends to tyranny and indifference.
Would you have a society of sovereigns?
That's libertarianism: the freedom to do what others don't prevent you from doing--the law of the jungle.
It's a far cry from the freedom to realise your human potential, and your children have no hope of achieving that in the current set-up, religion or no.
The New Atheists gurus and groupies just haven't thought it through, and that's my objection. You're just as intellectually-embarrassing as the fundamentalists you're fixated on.

But please correct me if I'm wrong.

"A bit like the Taliban having a meeting to discuss the Great Satan"

You equate discussing the issues those without belief face, like the Taliban discussing the Great Satan? lol

"Or the Provisional IRA/Ulster Defence Association discussing how to address their "differences", and whose kneecaps would feature in their action plans."

Yea a convention of atheists is just like the IRA kneecapping people. *rolls-eyes*

It appears to me that Australians getting together to deal with issues that they see in society is such an anathema to you, that you have to equate it to terrorist organisations. How sad :(

"Just a bunch of like-minded folk, in fact, having a bitch and a moan about people who don't agree with their views, and mulling over "what to do about it"."

Actually people getting together that feel the impositions imposed by religion in their life, it's about the privileges demanded by it, to be for example absolved from anti-discrimination law. I named a few others as well.

Why exactly should a religious group be able to discriminate eg: against single mothers? Isn't the person discriminated against regardless of the person doing it having a belief it's ok to do so? Do you think so long as someone believes something they should be able to impose that belief on others?

"With the only difference- at least, I hope it is a difference- being the level of violence proposed to "rectify" the situation."

Darn atheists, they are TALKING ABOUT STUFF. Violence! terrorists! militant atheists!

Darn atheists are having a convention! It's just like theists shooting doctors or flying planes into buildings! *rolls eyes*

Thanks for showing the bigotry that many atheists deal with every day simply for not having a belief in a god and daring to gather and voice it.

Your post is just a sample of the bigotry that permeates throughout our society.

You can be good without god. It's nice that many of faith have actually been supportive of the convention with the religious organised events also been published on the GAC fringe page.

While bigots are hamming it up.

David F, you did not understand my post, thus proving my assertion that relying on humanity, in this case, for even the most trivial considerations can sometimes be a perilous thing.

You assumed my statement meant that Atheists must seek the 'ultimate answer' from their fellow man. I am using the word 'ultimate' here as meaning final, not as the answer to life's deepest mysteries. My statement means that Atheists can only source their fellow man's opinion when asking any question, not when asking the ultimate question (whatever that may be).

Your lack of faith in humanity is fairly obvious from your posts, which leaves you with no God AND no sense of the relevance of humanity,which is clearly a bad place to be. It might be logical to you, but as it leaves you with an empty basket at the end of the day its not a particulary effective philosophy.

Richard Dawkins is not an Atheist.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2105834/Career-atheist-Richard-Dawkins-admits-fact-agnostic.html

Dear Atman,

You wrote: “the word 'ultimate' here as meaning final, not as the answer to life's deepest mysteries. My statement means that Atheists can only source their fellow man's opinion when asking any question, not when asking the ultimate question (whatever that may be.”

There are better means of answering questions than seeking opinions. One can examine the evidence, set up experiments and use reason based on the known facts. These procedures are embodied in the scientific method. If we restrict ourselves to answering questions based on what we are told big daddy in the sky recommends or what other people think we don’t get very far.

You mentioned my lack of faith in humanity.

Faith of any kind is a poor substitute for examining the evidence and using our reason to follow where it leads. We will find we cannot answer some questions. Sometimes questions are faulty in that they embody unprovable assumptions. Eg What is the purpose of life? That is a faulty question since it assumes that life has a purpose. If we ask meaningless questions we get meaningless answers.

I really don’t know what faith in humanity means. What do you mean by it? I don’t think there is such a thing as an ultimate question.

I think it best to ask particular well-thought out questions to which we can get answers. The answers can lead to further questions.

I am 86 and am still asking questions. If there were an ultimate question there would be no point in asking further questions.

One thing I am most interested in is fungi. I have been out with the Queensland Mycological Society on the last two weekends studying the fungi we find in this area of Australia. What we observe inspires us to ask questions. I have an interest in all forms of matter both animate and inanimate. We can find much in the world that doesn’t involve humanity at all. We are just one species among many. When we become extinct the world will simply go on without us.

"People know that a builder has a builder and they know this earth, our bodies and soul had a designer. People know that a universe cannot spawn out of nothing for no reason. It defies science."

Actually, it doesn't:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ImvlS8PLIo

Science is nearing the creation of a universe via a singularity in a collider while simultaneously growing to understanding that the creation can occur without purpose or reason. If god exists, it is within ourselves.

Squeers, so many words trying to convince of the existence of a moral god. The Bible was written by men. Science has no place for morality, people determine that.