[Mr. Vega]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/02/11/reports-3-young-muslims-slain-in-chapel-hill-shooting-n-c-man-charged/

The police are speculating Hicks may have murdered them in a dispute over parking, but his facebook page is also loaded with anti-Islam (and anti-Christian) posts, including this quote:

People say nothing can solve the Middle East problem, not mediation, not arms, not financial aid. I say there is something. Atheism.

Hmmm. I suspect that the term "militant atheism" is about to take on a whole new meaning. And I can't wait to see demands for moderate atheists to condemn the attacks (I know Dawkins has).

[Lorric]

I bet it's got nothing to do with any of that.

If three Christians or three atheists were murdered or pretty much three anything, nobody would be jumping down that rabbit hole, at the very least so quickly.

Are we really going to get paranoid about someone saying atheism could solve the problem in the Middle East? Really? Seriously?

I could at least entertain the idea if he'd said nukes could solve the problem in the middle east, but even that is something people just throw around without meaning it.

It's entirely possible someone can murder three people and it have nothing to do with religion.

I'm not saying the idea this could have been religiously motivated should be discarded, not at all, but this kind of immediate sensationalist conclusion jump, no. Wait. Wait and see how the investigation goes. Whatever the motivation, he killed three people. He's 46 years old. He'll be lucky if he manages to avoid dying in prison.

[Aesaar]

People say nothing can solve the Middle East problem, not mediation, not arms, not financial aid. I say there is something. Atheism.

The guy has absolutely no idea what the problems in the Middle-East are about.

Anyway, yet another example that extremism isn't the fault of religion.

[Bobboau]

Was just about to post this.
Thus far the police are saying it appeared to be an escalation of a long standing mundane dispute.


from all the reports sounds like they were really awesome people :/

[Dragon]

The shooting itself seems a fairly mundane affair. It seems like a fairly standard case of a short-tempered idiot losing his patience and neglecting to involve the often-underused organ known as a brain. It's nothing new, the entire world has idiots would would beat someone to death/shoot someone over a parking spot, a bottle of vodka or other similarly mundane things. The fact that thinking should precede action, not the other way around, never occurs to annoyingly many people, sometimes with tragic results. I have to say, Hicks lived up to his name.

What is interesting is how other people react to it. It seems to me that accusations of "hate crimes" are much more common than actual hate crimes. If the victims were black, he'd be accused of racism, nevermind that he's likely just a petty idiot with a gun and a grudge against those particular people. Similarly, we wouldn't have had this thread if they weren't Muslims - or indeed, hardly anyone outside the local community would've heard of it. It's just that hate crimes sell, apparently.

[Lorric]

What is interesting is how other people react to it. It seems to me that accusations of "hate crimes" are much more common than actual hate crimes. If the victims were black, he'd be accused of racism, nevermind that he's likely just a petty idiot with a gun and a grudge against those particular people. Similarly, we wouldn't have had this thread if they weren't Muslims - or indeed, hardly anyone outside the local community would've heard of it. It's just that hate crimes sell, apparently.

Exactly. It bugs me. It's almost like people think there's no other possible reason someone could kill these people besides something racially motivated, when more often than not it has nothing to do with it. Compare to if it's the other way around, there's usually a solid reason for the speculation if it's a white person killed by a black person with a speculation of racial motive. That should be applied across the board.

On a lighter note, the Hicks thing, when I read Vega's post the first time, I thought he was saying they were killed by a bunch of hillbillies.

[Luis Dias]

I suspect that the term "militant atheism" is about to take on a whole new meaning.

It may, but I agree with Lorric here. Isn't it too soon to attribute militant atheism as the prime motive here? Perhaps inference is warranted here, IDK I have to look into it deeper, but there are no fatwas against muslims in Atheism Holy Books, and so I'm kinda meh about it.

[Dragon]

He's not referring to the killing itself (which, in itself, seems to have had nothing to do with race nor religion), but to comments people made after the fact. And plenty of them are very much militant *insert religion here*. And yes, "Atheism" in that context is very much a religion. Being religious is not directly correlated to believing in any divine being, most (but not all) religions require you to believe in one or several, but one can believe without being a member of religion. A small number of religions (certain forms of Buddhism, for instance) can also do without a supreme being that is to be believed in. There's a brand of Atheism that is essentially a religion based on non-existence of God (usually believing in "Science" instead). They have fanatics, militants and preachers, too.

There's also atheism, which is a more general term simply denoting lack of belief in a supreme being. But nobody cares about this definition anymore.

On a lighter note, the Hicks thing, when I read Vega's post the first time, I thought he was saying they were killed by a bunch of hillbillies.

Yeah, my first thought was like this, too. There was just one "hillbilly", thought appropriately named and likely having all the necessary traits (aside from actually living in the South). Apart from that, the story sounds like something you'd expect to happen "down south". Sadly, this mentality is common through the world. You can find plenty of people like that wherever you go (though in Europe, they tend to bludgeon you with farm implements or empty alcohol bottles, rather than shoot).

[Mr. Vega]

What this actually makes me think of is Matthew Shepard. His killers I believe claimed at the time (they certainly did later) that it was just a robbery that became a murder. Nobody bought that one. I'm not buying this one either. Maybe it was a parking dispute that finally set him off, but c'mon guys, he'd made his feelings on Muslims very clear prior to shooting 3 of them. That's one hell of a correlation to not be causation.

[Lorric]

Even if it was militant atheism, this would be the very first time I have heard of an atheist killing religious people because of it. Even if it wasn't the first time, there is no pattern of this coming from atheists. There is no track record. That's as ridiculous as if a vegetarian killed someone for eating meat, or if someone straight edge killed someone for drinking or taking drugs. Does the view on those things change just because of a single lunatic?

What this actually makes me think of is Matthew Shepard. His killers I believe claimed at the time (they certainly did later) that it was just a robbery that became a murder. Nobody bought that one. I'm not buying this one either. Maybe it was a parking dispute that finally set him off, but c'mon guys, he'd made his feelings on Muslims very clear prior to this. That's one hell of a correlation to not be causation.

Come on, the worst they could cherry pick was atheism could solve the problem in the middle east? You can hear worse than that in my house (not from me.)

[Mr. Vega]

http://weaselzippers.us/213787-3-muslim-students-shot-to-death-in-chapel-hill-by-man-who-described-himself-as-militant-atheist/

I'm not going to put too much stock in calling yourself a militant atheist - I don't bat an eyelash at being called a militant feminist - but three people over a parking space? I'm just not buying it with that elephant in the room.

[Lorric]

Remember the guy who shot someone in the cinema that was on here a few months ago? That was less than this even if it was just a single incident, and it was something that was ongoing, allowing rage to build up.

[Mr. Vega]

I am using all evidence available to me. I'm not going to go "let's just ignore this stuff and try to come up with an explanation without it so we can dismiss having to consider it."

[Lorric]

I am using all evidence available to me. I'm not going to go "let's just ignore this stuff and try to come up with an explanation without it so we can dismiss having to consider it."

I'm not doing that.

I'm trying to show you people can and do kill over stupid little things quite frequently. It happens here in the UK, so in the US it's all too easy with guns all over the place.

I think the militant atheist thing should be looked into as well, but I think the evidence way too flimsy for people to be going on a conclusion jump.

[Dragon]

It happens everywhere. In US, guns make it easier. In Poland (and Russia) vodka makes it quicker to happen and is almost always involved. In fact, it's so universal that I can tell a lot about Hicks without even meeting him (in fact, enough not to ever want to meet him). I can keep away from this kind of scum, so I do, but this is not always that easy. They're usually lower class (if one of them somehow gets higher than that, you get the worst kind of noveau riche), but so are many nice people who don't have an option of "just move out of this crappy district".

Remember the guy who shot someone in the cinema that was on here a few months ago? That was less than this even if it was just a single incident, and it was something that was ongoing, allowing rage to build up.

This is likely exactly the same reaction. Yes, three people because of a parking space. I've seen local news reported on people did worse (or tried to) for equally petty reasons. He likely was in the wrong, or otherwise unable to have this dispute resolved in his favor. It likely dragged on for quite long, too. This is something akin to beating up one's husband because he leaves the toilet seat up. Weak, unintelligent people often resort to violence when they have a problem and can't think of a way to solve it (not only against humans, this kind of reaction can also manifest as swearing and hitting a defective appliance that fails to work). This also goes hand in hand with acting on emotions instead of thinking.

He could hate Muslims, Blacks, immigrants, everyone different from him. He probably does, since lack of tolerance common to this kind of people. But it's unlikely this was a hate crime, though it might have contributed to his frustration and accelerated it a bit. He hated those people in general, and in a more "personal" way than blanket hate for entire ethnic groups. Also, it's quite likely that this dispute contributed to his hatred of Muslims as well - it's common for anger at specific members of a group to be transferred to the group in general (TBH, many people are guilty of that one, not only uneducated louts).

[Bobboau]

What this actually makes me think of is Matthew Shepard. His killers I believe claimed at the time (they certainly did later) that it was just a robbery that became a murder. Nobody bought that one. I'm not buying this one either. Maybe it was a parking dispute that finally set him off, but c'mon guys, he'd made his feelings on Muslims very clear prior to shooting 3 of them. That's one hell of a correlation to not be causation.

You mean the comments about where he said that Muslims are all bad people and need to die? that's what he said right, your not just misrepresenting him because that's what you think and you want the racist punished, right? honestly, I'm at work and I haven't  had a chance to read much on the details here, but he didn't like religion, he thought religion was bad, that didn't mean he hated people who were religious. you are jumping into a lynch mob. If you want to jump to conclusions here fine, but this is odd. you don't hear about Atheists killing people because they are religious very often. As eager as you may be to have that happen so you can jump to the defense of a vulnerable minority and use it as a tool to censor people you disagree with it's not something we have seen much up until now. Yeah, I have my own confirmation bias operating here too, but maybe you should take your own advice and wait to see what evidence comes forth. If the situation were reversed how would you be reacting? Show me how this is done.

[Bobboau]

"Atheism" in that context is very much a religion.

<semantics>under no context is atheism a religion</semantics>

if you want to argue make a separate thread

[StarSlayer]

More than likely this guy is just an asshole.  Assholes are killing people everyday all over the world, if the victims weren't Muslim and the assailant wasn't an internet troll this wouldn't be getting any more traction than any other triple homicide.  Unless bands of atheists start holding murder rallies and burning Darwin Fish effigies in front of peoples' houses I think its safe to assume the atheism angle is nothing more than a media sound bite.

[Mr. Vega]

As eager as you may be to have that happen so you can jump to the defense of a vulnerable minority and use it as a tool to censor people you disagree with it's not something we have seen much up until now.

If you want to turn this thread into accusations about how I'm oppressing you, don't post in it. For everyone's sake.

And you'll notice I'm the only one in the thread pushing the hate crime angle. Somehow I'm the one trying to censor YOU.

[Bobboau]

**** you, atheists are as much an vulnerable minority as Muslims. you want to turn this into a thread about how atheists are just obviously hate murders maybe it's you who should not be posting.