Christians openly advocate killing and raping atheists on FOX News Facebook page

They said there were over 8,000 death threats.

8,000 death threats.

There were threats of killing, many by firearm (how many actually specifically advocated to "shoot 'em"?), and raping the atheist heathens galore, several typed directly after they professed their love for Jesus Christ.

All this comes after American Atheists filed a law suit to have the cross removed from Ground Zero.

(source)

"The cross has become a Christian icon. It has been blessed by so-called holy men a few times, and presented as a reminder that God, in his infinite power of goodness, who couldn’t be bothered to stop the Muslim terrorists, or stop the fire, or hold up the buildings to stop 3000 people from being crushed, cared enough to bestow upon us some rubble that resembles a cross. Ridiculous."
- American Atheists' Blog

I know, I know. Every Christian person who may stumble across the comments made on FOX's Facebook page may think something along the lines of, "Those aren't real Christians!" or, "Not all Christians are like that." I agree with you, and most atheists would agree with you too. We have friends and family members who are Christian. Some may use to have been Christians themselves. We are perfectly aware that not every Christian on the planet is dead set on killing and raping every atheist they come across.

As shocking as some of those commenters' words may be, this violence really does not surprise me. As a queer person, I am very aware of the long, growing list of hate crimes committed against gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans* and intersexed people every day. Many of those crimes are religiously motivated.

The buck does not stop there. The pro-life movement is made almost completely of religious individuals, and as Sandy Rapp has said, "Praying in the light, bombing in the night," with a total of 96 incidences of violence -- including murder, death threats, vandalism, arson and bombing -- against United States and Canadian abortion clinics in 2010.

Again, "Not all Christians are like that! They do not represent all Christians!" I can hear it and I agree. Just like the extremists on 9/11 do not represent all followers of Islam and Westboro does not represent all Baptists, I understand these violent words are not endorsed by all followers of the Christian god.

Is it surprising that there is so much violence perpetrated in the name of Christianity, though? Look at the Christian holy book, the Bible. There is rape, murder, and God-sanctioned killing littered throughout it's pages.

"Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves."
-Numbers 31:17-18

"If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found; Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days."
-Deuteronomy 22:28-29

"Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones."
-Psalm 137:9

"I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not."
-Jude 1:5

(There is really more blood in the Bible than your standard Hollywood slasher, symbolic and otherwise.)
(I prefer the King James version because unicorns!)

And of course, in the end, atheists suffer eternally in the fires of Hell. God is love!

I have blogged before about violence in the Bible the United States' shaky Christian/atheist relationship (click here!).

I have just been thinking a bit, we have all heard similar violent things from the mouths of Christians before. According to Christians, the Christian god loves everyone. That makes it okay for him to send millions of people into the fires of Hell to suffer eternally. He loves them. Some may even argue sinners and non-believers send themselves to Hell. "How dare you use your God-given rationality to think rationally!"

If someone has a gun to your head and tells you do do something or they will shoot, and you not obeying them causes you to get shot, it is not the shooter's fault you were shot, it is your own fault because you disobeyed them.

Those comments on Fox's Facebook page are shocking, but not surprising. We have heard them before, and we will be hearing similar words from believers again and again for the rest of our lives.