UCF Professor Takes Action Against “Religious Bigotry” in Class

3 Comments

• Aaron J Herstol says:

  August 28, 2012 at 11:22 pm

  I applaud Dr. Negy for both his letter and for what he does as a profession. Thank you, sir, for supporting open mindedness and teaching students to not be so narrow-minded in their way of thinking.

  To the guy above me (BVP), you speak of “true Christians.” Well, what’s a true Christian? Is there really a clear cut answer to that? Because the answers seems to be subjective to one’s point of view. Take for example the heavenly folks over at the Westboro Baptist Church. I bet if you asked them who they thought were “true” Christians, they’d all raise their hands while at the same time condemning you and your unborn children to an eternity in hell. A lot of Christians would argue that those nutjobs weren’t “true” Christians, but through the eyes of the latter, their convictions are just as valid as those seen through the eyes of your typical, everyday Christian.

  Which also begs the question, if the Westboro Baptist Church aren’t “true” Christians because of their sins (I use the word “true” a lot because Christians love to toss the word around like they would a hot potato), and the Bible states humans are born into sin, then how is anybody a Christian?…Oh, that’s right, because all you have to do is accept Jesus to be Christian. Oh, but wait, WBC already did that! Uh oh, and therein lies a problem! A person who has any sense of reason would see that there’s a clear contradiction in this analogy. Unfortunately, any further argument would be rebutted and rendered useless by usage of an infamous tactic known as circular logic. Christians don’t even know they do it they’re so good at it.

  It’s funny how Christians preach the truth and use a 2000 year old text filled with parables — similar to those found in a child’s story book –, allegories, and senseless violence to justify their credibility. And they do it with such abiding, hypocritical arrogance. It’s just mindbogglingly ironic how a Christian can blame a skeptic for being a bigot when the text from which the former bases his morality blatantly condones racial, ethnic and gender inequality. Oh but wait, I suppose all of that is probably being “taken out of context,” right?

  And then there are your scientists, philosophers, engineers and other scholarly individuals who profess truth (or close to it) derived through data analysis, experiments and other worldly observations. If an answer isn’t apparent and straight forward at first, a theory can be drawn from information and data already collected. You don’t have to take a class on logic to see that this methodology makes a lot more sense than does the Christian’s “godditit” explanation for everything. I can tell you first hand as an engineering student attending UCF, the fact that you can induce a voltage in a conductor by passing a current through another — and then pawn this phenomenon off as being truth — sounds a lot less INSANE than claiming a dude managed to stuff all the world’s animals into a single boat so as to avoid being wiped out by an “omnibenevolent” god. Plus the electromagnetic induction thing described above can be PROVEN; the other, not so much.

  And with that I conclude that Christianity is sheer absurdity and it deserves to be called out and questioned by every inquisitive mind, especially those who attend a university, taking a PHILOSOPHY class.
• Responder says:

  August 23, 2012 at 3:55 pm

  UCF Alumni –

  Your response, along with so many others like it posted elsewhere, prove a sad truth about Professor Negy’s well written, thoughtful discourse… It will fall upon deaf ears for those who most badly need to ingest its message. The conclusion that Professor Negy is or is not of any religious belief most certainly cannot be concluded from his plea to his students. The letter simply urges his students to move through life with an open mind, an understanding that their view is not the only valid view and may not always be the correct one, that an open dialogue is healthy for the learning and advancement of an individual and, finally, that a succinct argument grounded with reason and/or facts is much more effective than arguing with force.

  Thank you.
• UCF Alum says:

  August 20, 2012 at 7:30 pm

  Dr. Negy, as a UCF alum I’d like to provide you with feedback on the “letter” you sent to your students and posted on this site.

  Based on the condescending screed found in your letter I submit that at best, you are intellectually dishonest and worst, an intellectually dishonest and cowardly bigot. Either way, you are unworthy to teach. I’ve heard ivory tower bully’s like you in the news media and academia all my life. You love to throw rocks at soft targets (e.g. Christians) because you know that a true Christian will not respond with true hate. You know, the ugly horrors perpetrated by a religion that will remain nameless (hint, starts with “I”). Christians make an easy target for you; they are ubiquitous, racist hate mongers, and conveniently, they are silent. You’ve found a nice captive audience to preach not skills any student would want to use in the “real world,” but rather, multi-cultural poison spews like vomit from as you proclaim it the new God. Why, present a counter argument based on faith, love and tolerance, would be, uh, stupid right? And let’s face it, these Neanderthal UCF kids need to be spoon fed because as “first generation” university students are just TOO malleable. What a happy little bubble, your world. Must be nice never having to consider that you might, just, be wrong…

  BVP

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