Agnostic ex-Hindu here; I found the BlasphemousArt series really witty from a satirical perspective - but am really doubtful about whether it will help in “desensitisation” due to its not-so-wide reach to its intended audience. What do you guys define “desensitisation” as? How does it help us and what can be done to further it’s reach?
Greetings and welcome.
I would define desensitization as the deliberate reduction of emotional response to averse or contrary stimuli or information, specifically through the use of repeated exposure to such, in a controlled or limited manner so as not to exacerbate the emotional sensitivity, but rather interrupt the direct stimulus-response mechanism.
Other than to seize any and all appropriate opportunities to present contrary messages, there is a barrier to delivering those messages to the ones who need it most.
As to how it helps us, I would posit that some of us are still carrying some baggage from indoctrination and anything that can serve to disarm the weapon of religion can be useful.
Since you have identified yourself as agnostic, do you care to offer your definition?
Edit for Ed
What do you mean Agnostic? Everyone is agnostic. Agnostic Hindus, Christians, Muslims, Jews, do you know one person on the planet who has any actual knowledge of a God or gods? Are you a theist or atheist? ‘Agnostic means you have no “Knowledge” of God or gods. The question we ask around here is “What do you believe?” Atheism is about ‘belief’ and Gnosticism is about "knowledge.’
Who do you think the intended audience is? Who do you think is on the AR mailing list? I assume they know who their intended audience is. Are you asserting that the art is for some religious sect? Why would some religious sect have an AR account. Why are they not just supporting the atheist community by poking fun at the Hindu gods. We sit around here all day posting and writing blasphemous things about the Christian God. Here are a couple.
So, realistically, what’s your point?
Education is the Bane of religion. The more one knows about the world they live in, the less likely they are to be religious. With that said, the ole expression; “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” holds true. “You can lead a theist to knowledge but you can’t make them think.”
Look at you? Are you thinking? It does not appear so? You don’t even know what an “Agnostic” is.
I submit to you that even the Gnostic Atheist (A person who Knows there is no god.) is in an untenable position. How do you evidence the claim? I admit that the evidence available all points to the conclusion that there is no god, but it is not a demonstrated fact.
As for the agnostic theists; they are hoping their God does not examine them too close. Pascal’s Wager; Believing in a god so you can get to heaven, is a move that any supreme being will see right through and it is a sure path to Hell, should one actually believe in such nonsense.
Now that leaves you with an Agnostic Atheist position. The position that no one knows a damn thing about God and so there is really no reason to believe.
The Gnostic theist is a gullible sod who had generally convinced himself that his own emotional states are evidence of personal contact with a deity. The Krishna Consciousness movement was big on this. Restrict your diet, limit sleep, dance and chant all night, and you too can experience god. The Christians call it the Holy Spirit and end up crying to talking in tongues or some such nonsense. “I have experienced the hand of God!” What they mean is that they have convinced themselves that they are special and the all powerful god of the universe is talking directly to them because they feel it.
You are either an Atheist or an Theist. There is no middle ground. Atheism and Theism are about what you believe. Agnosticism and Gnosticism are about what you KNOW.
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I agree, but I enjoy hearing the desperate attempts to portray Agnosticism as a halfway between position.
Of course that is absurd, but I am supremely interested in pretzel logic…
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I just fine it annoying. Especially after it is CLEARLY pointed out and DEMONSTRATED, with citation, facts, evidence, and the person comes directly back having heard NONE OF IT, as in the recent ‘Cosmological’ post.
Let’s see what happens next…
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I’m not sure how to categorize myself.
I don’t believe in God because there seems to be no credible evidence . . . yet absence of evidence does not constitute a proof of absence, so I like to believe that I have an open mind.
To make a point, consider intelligent, advanced aliens for a moment.
There is no “hard evidence” that they exist.
I believe that they exist because the Universe is very large and very old, and odds seem to overwhelmingly favor their existence, but it is certainly possible that we are the first intelligent civilization, if only because somebody has to be first.
In a like manner, I see no evidence for God’s existence . . . and I choose to believe in something only if there’s evidence, as I don’t want to deceive myself by believing in something simply because it’s comfortable and/or appealing.
If I believed in something because it’s comfortable, then I would go broke gambling because it’s “a sure thing,” or I’d be arrested and imprisoned for stalking Megan Fox out of a conviction that she’s in love with me.
If–however–a physicist or mathematician was able to furnish evidence and/or proof of God’s existence, then I would examine the evidence carefully and with skepticism . . . as well as with an open mind, and I’d modify my beliefs accordingly depending upon the quality of my findings.
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I am of the same mind, I have not discounted a god. Because of contradictions, I find it impossible to believe the Abrahamic god exists, but that does not disqualify other religions and gods. Still waiting.
Other intelligent life is a very real possibility within this huge universe, I consider to rational to believe they can exist because how the laws of physics work and that brought about humanity. If it worked once in our little corner of the universe, it can work elsewhere.
But a god? There is absolutely nothing in science, history, and physics that supports the notion of a god. Even though I have not discounted the possibility of a god, unlike an alien intelligent civilization, it is all a work of fanciful imagination with nothing to support a god.
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You are of course wrong. The absence of evidence is evidence of absence when that evidence is rightfully expected to prove or significantly demonstrate a claim.
For example: If I tell you there is a dead body in the trunk of my car. We can verify this by going out to the car and opening the trunk.
But lets say there is no body in the trunk. Well, the body could have been moved. So we check for fluids, hair, DNA, crushed carpet, anything and everything that could possibly indicate that a dead body had been in the trunk. We find nothing. We can conclude ‘There was never a dead body in the trunk.’
“Proof” is a math construct and it does not apply in the real world. In the real world we rely on facts and evidence, not proofs. There were absolutely no facts and no evidence supporting the claim of a dead body in the trunk of the car. NONE. The conclusion that there was not a dead body in the trunk of that car is therefore justified.
A lack of evidence is in fact evidence of absence. It is not proof. There is no such thing as proof in the real world. Science does not deal with ‘Proof.’
Now, when it comes to the god thing, we have half a million failed gods. We have another couple thousand active ones who all say different things and oppose each other and if any one of them is correct all the others are false. We have no evidence at all for any supernatural claims. This god thing has not left fingerprints anywhere. There is no DNA. There is no crushed carpet. There is no blood splatter. There are no body fluids. There is not one thing you can point to and say; “This might be evidence.” Not one thing. 6000 years of stories? You gotta do better than that.
Absence of evidence is evidence of absence. “Evidence, not 'proof.” And after 6000 Years PRETTY FUCKING SIGNIFICANT EVIDENCE AT THAT.
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Whoa there my slap happy Simian dialogist…
Since that is presently unfalsifiable, concluding such would be at best conjecture and at worst investigative malpractice. Rather we can ASSUME “there was never a dead body in the trunk”…Indeed absence of evidence is evidence of absence, however, the question bulging into the room with an elephant trunk bellowing loudly might be how convincing is that “evidence”, and is there additional evidence supporting the assumption of absence, or conflicting evidence of equal or greater demonstrative value.
Rather, the absence demonstrates the refutation of the argument for existence, since existence REQUIRES evidence, which is absent. Otherwise, any claim of existences would demand acceptance upon the delivery of the claim.
Realistically, if you claimed there was a dead body in your trunk, it would be a distraction to lead us away from the body buried in your fucking flower bed…
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The fact that the dead body-looking thing that someone saw stuffed into the trunk of my car was actually not a body and could never be identified as a body or anything resembling a body but from the vantage point of the nosey neighbors had nothing to do with the fact that I am an evil amateur magician who loves fucking with the Christian neighbors, and that could in no way be construed as supplemental evidence supporting the claim that there was anything resembling a dead body in the trunk of the car.
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Ahhhh can you feel it? There it is…the admission of pestilential theatrical histrionics for the purposes of pestering, harassment and deception.
Uuhhhhh oohh… it feels GOOD to come clean 
, doesn’t it? You are now absolved and forgiven… (now, say five “Hail Skritens” and stfu)
Edit for toecutter
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Ya know, now that you mention it, Cog did get the “Neighborhood Best Flower Garden Award” for the past couple of years. Hmmm… 
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Shit! … I mean … shit… it’s all about the shit. The poo. You know… poo … having lots of poo and knowing just how to use it. Dead bodies… Ha! Not around here. Nope. Not here. No dead bodies. Just us poo flingers.
EDIT>>> All right FUCK There’s a dead body in the fucking garden. So what. It was never in the trunk of the car. And any DNA it contained has long been dissolved by now. It was a fucking window washer that fell into a batch of eggnog that Tinman was making. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that the secret ingredient in last year’s Christmas eggnog was Lysol, Windex, and a dead window washer. I hooked the guy out, drug him home, and buried him in the garden. So what. He was already dead.
Okay, Fuck. Mostly dead. That fucking wheezy little choking sound he was making didn’t mean a damn thing. Once I started piling the dirt on him, he didn’t even try very hard to dig himself out. He only sat up once … and went right back down when I smashed the shovel across the back of his head to see if he would react and say “Ouch!” He didn’t say a damn thing. He just laid there. So I buried him. What’s the problem?
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He was still somewhat alive and you BURIED HIM??? 
What the fuck is WRONG with you??? You could have possibly SAVED that guy! Now that he’s all buried and rotted, how the hell am I suppose to use him in this year’s batch? You idiot!
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Well that would be the relevant and pertinent question then wouldn’t it ?
All I’m sayin’ is that he could have at least had the common decency to ask me about the guy before burying him. After all, that was the BEST batch of nog EVER. But does he care about that? Noooooooo… All he thinks about is himself and his stupid flower garden. (In all fairness, though, I do have to admit his lily plot looked quite beautiful that year.)
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No No No You’re looking at this all the wrong way. He was mostly dead. And… he wasn’t moving anyway. I thought you had plans to use skri…um… someone else in this year’s batch. That’s what the note said. “Bring the bird seed and let me borrow the rolling pin you have stuck up your ass. Meet me behind the 7/11.”
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On the plus side, this years crop of bananas have just been outstanding, and the peels are the most potent I have smoked in years.
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Uh, you do realize that those giant Lillies were Amorphophallus Titanum, the “Corpse Flower”? Sneaky bastard didn’t think anyone would notice, but those are widely known in the bird world…He couldn’t help himself but leave a clue. Such arrogance is staggering…
Pecker edit
Wha the…YOU FUCKERS!
and I had a nice picnic planned…
Edit for shock