Instigator / Con
4
1641
rating
63
debates
65.08%
won
Topic
#718

Is Christianity Disadvantageous To An Individual?

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
0
3
Better sources
2
2
Better legibility
1
1
Better conduct
1
1

After 1 vote and with 3 points ahead, the winner is...

Wrick-It-Ralph
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
5
Time for argument
Three days
Max argument characters
30,000
Voting period
One week
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Pro
7
1402
rating
44
debates
40.91%
won
Description

We will argue whether Christianity, based on the Bible, is disadvantageous to the person who believes. This is based on the New Covenant, not the Old Covenant.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

"If God doesn't exist, that means her never gave any moral edicts and things like slavery and homophobia and circumcision, etc ,etc."
Where God endorse those? And, don't cite Old testament passages.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

You need studies which shows that Christianity is the cause of that.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph
@Speedrace

sorry...those comments to SpeedRace were meant for Wrick-it Ralph

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@Speedrace

Seems you have Christianity all wrong. REAL Christianity is not about condemning the invididual (i.e. homosexuals) but rather condemning the ACT.

Believing in eternal life does not mean you don't value life. On the contrary, it means that what you do in THIS life DOES matter and has an impact on your eternal life.

What was the context in which Jesus told them not to wash their hands? HOw are YOU so sure your understanding of what Jesus said is the correct understanding?

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@Speedrace

same

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

Welp, gg dude nice :D

Someone hurry up and vote for me pls

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@killshot

“they are clearly recognized by God differently from others.”

Pretty much

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@Speedrace

They are clearly an isolated group of individuals that are segregated from others by God as his chosen people above all others (deut 7:6). They are also the oracles of God's word and many other things. Regardless of any additional roles or responsibilities, they are clearly recognized by God differently from others.

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@killshot

Well, again, they receive responsibility as well as rewards, and besides that, they frequently received many various punishments in the Bible as well, but God’s giving them Moreno responsibility and rewards isn’t evidence that he loves them more

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@Speedrace

deut 7:6 - KJV

For thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God: the Lord thy God hath "chosen" thee to be a "special people" unto himself, "above all people" that are upon the face of the earth.

This is one example.. But there are numerous other inferences and suggestions that would imply that's the case. Romans 3 is one example stating Jews are the oracles of his knowledge, further suggesting nepotism.

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@killshot

Lol, to my knowledge God has never said that he loves the Jews more than the Gentiles, which is another factor

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@Speedrace

haha "I didn't say the color was red, but its not every other color"..

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@killshot

I did, I don’t say “favorite” because of the connotations that come with that, God never said that he would bless others LESS, but rather that the Jews would get blessed MORE, however they still have MORE responsibilities

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@Speedrace

Not favorite, but they are his chosen people (above others). That makes no sense haha

Read Deut 7:6

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@killshot

Not favorite. Yes, he appointed them as his chosen people to receive many things other people wouldn’t, but that comes with responsibility. They have the responsibility to do good to others. It’s not all sunshine and roses; in fact, the Jews rebelled against their calling many times. Why would they do that if it was only exceptionally good things? It’s almost as if they are an older sibling; they have to do more chores but they also get a car, their own TV, a phone, etc. God was showing that he would bless them I feel they fulfilled their duties

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@Speedrace

But Jews are God's favorite, above all other people. Would you agree? It's supported by Biblical verses (Romans 3, Deut 7:6, etc)

Seems nepotistic to me..

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@Ramshutu

Gotcha, thanks

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@Wrick-It-Ralph
@Speedrace

A key and common thread that runs through most of the serious debates I’ve seen are that:

1.) Debaters forget what the resolution is.
2.) Debaters get fixated and tied up with the arguments presented to them, and forget to spend the time challenging the assumptions of them. 90% of the time, the arguments made by both sides are absolutely correct: but their correctness depends on the implicit assumptions both sides are being made. I can’t see those assumptions, and they often get hidden or obfuscated - so often I end up having to judge based on which assumption is more compelling, and more justified.
3.) Debaters don’t show the weight of harms.

This is what happened imo - both sides sort of lost track of what each other’s arguments were predicated on - and as pro did a better job of outlining his assumptions and justifying them, it was difficult for me to go the other way.

Imo the debate would have been better served had you adopted the happiness counterpoint, and argued that better - and the remainder was either about Gods existence, or possibility - or simply arguing about how much of a real harm pros points really constitute. If you had argued that pros harms are either rare, or have minimal impact - you could have argued that the objective benefits (happiness, community, overall morality) outweighs them.

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@killshot

The Bible itself doesn’t prefer Jews, however they are God’s chosen people. This essentially means that they were the line through which God chose to birth Jesus. That said, he consistently shows that he loves the Gentiles (such as moi) just as much.

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@Speedrace

re: You said the Bible doesn't prefer whites to blacks, I agree. What about Jews?

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@Speedrace

I shant =p

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@killshot

Thanks. Now I know.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

Refusing medical treatment usually comes from Jesus, post resurrection, in Mark 16:15-18.

Because you asked for a reference in the future. I didn't read all the comments, so perhaps someone already gave you this?

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

Don’t hold back on the snarky comments next time, I need something going for me :P

Welp, There’s goes my win ratio lol

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@Speedrace

Okay, but you literally said that in your debate so why do you need to keep repeating it. it's a voter appeal. This is why I blocked you on DDO because you take this too personally and let it spill out into the comments. Can you just let the debate resolve itself please? This makes arguing against you no fun.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

I wasn’t trying to get votes, I was clarifying the position that you warped in the last round.

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@Speedrace

The debate is over. Please stop making voter appeals in the comments as it's bad conduct and also kind of a cheap move.

I’m not sure if voters will see this, but I never committed a no-true-Scotsman fallacy. When you do that, you say that someone isn’t a Christian, but I never said that. All I said was that those beliefs we were discussing were their opinion and not from the Bible. They’re still Christians. I just wanted to make that clear.

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@TheRealNihilist

well to me and you, it would just be like therapy or something. But some people add the extra meaning behind that and maybe it acts as a placebo or something, I don't know. I was never a hardcore Christian. I was only soft indoctrinated.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

Why couldn't you use prayer instead of using fancy words?
Does it mean more than just prayer?

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@Speedrace

agreed

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@TheRealNihilist

Like if the act of prayer made someone happy, that would be a direct tie to religion that would not necessarily be a specific religion. Or if the act of being religious (i.e. having a list of practices that you always acknowledged) might make you happier.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

What do you mean by " direct tie "?

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

Ok, I’m gonna our the following statement at the beginning of the round, check it for me please

To voters, me and my opponent talked in the comments and, essentially, we are not disregarding the first round but rather my counterclaim because it is unnecessary. My burden of proof is only in proving my opponent wrong. I apologize for the confusion.

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@Speedrace

That's fine, As long as you're still supporting BoP for any claims you make. Not a big deal either way. I have an aggressive tone in my debates, lol. It's the nature of competition

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

I’m super confused, I wasn’t trying to disregard the round but rather the counterclaim because we both said that the counterclaim was unnecessary, and that my burden of proof was in proving your claims wronga, not giving claims of Christianity actually being advantageous, is that not the case?

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@TheRealNihilist

True, of course there could be a direct tie that is not named specifically. Are you certain that there is no connection at all?

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

I shouldn't be talking about this but his source is false. You are not even talking about it so it would not be a problem of the debate. If I was debating I would have said he hasn't filled his burden of proof but if it was shared then I will give my proof but I will acknowledge his source to be incorrect because 1) It is not even sourced properly 2) Even when you find the source it has no mention of Religion.

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@K_Michael

The height and width have to be the same. The resolution of my computer is 1366x768. In order for it to not show white bars if the actual image is 1366x768 it would require the image to be 768x768 which means a lot from the right and left have to be cropped out in order to do so which does reduce the quality of the picture on this site and might not even be usable.

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@TheRealNihilist

I would also like to point out that sometimes not every statement needs a direct rebuttal. Some rebuttals will rebuttal whole concepts which ultimately leads to certain ideas being thrown off the table indirectly. If we had to rebuttal every single statement, debates would be too complex for anyone to read and then summarize in their heads.

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@TheRealNihilist

I think the white bars mean that your photo isn't square.

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@TheRealNihilist
@dave2242

Thanks for the verification. I only thought it was him because of his profile pic. Once I compared there debate styles, I suspected I may have been wrong, plus he made multiple references to himself on DDO which would be strange if he was incognito.

As for Speedrace's sources, I'm not sure I really need to address them at all and I don't want him to feel like he's being ganged up on by taking your tips, but I do appreciate it. Even if Christianity did make people happier on average, happiness is ultimately subjective and cannot be easily measured by science. The objective practical disadvantages far outweigh any mere happiness especially when we consider that atheists can easily be happy without taking on that baggage.

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@TheRealNihilist
@Wrick-It-Ralph

our_boat_is_right was our_boat_is_right on ddo as well

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@TheRealNihilist

Thanks, but the white bars don't really bother me that much. I appreciate the offer.

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@bsh1

Do you have a link to your picture? I am able to remove the white bars on the left and right. Just noticed it right now.

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@bsh1

Okay. Should have kept it to myself. My mistake. The only thing the contender needs to do in order to not be influenced by what I said is simply miss out the only evidence Speedrace gave.

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@TheRealNihilist

While not against site rules, it is considered bad form to assist someone on a debate (see your comment 32). Debaters should succeed or fail on their own merits, and those debaters who do not receive assistance have a legitimate gripe against those who do, because it provides an unfair and one-sided advantage to their opponents. Really, it's just not appropriate to try to help debaters win specific debates.

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@Wrick-It-Ralph

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/wellbeing/articles/measuringnationalwellbeing/2016
Even this one has nothing to do with Religion.