In defence of trollishness

[gominokouhai]

Insult to intelligence

A reference to God as an "imaginary invisible friend in the sky" (Letters, 22 October) is not a "telling characterisation", but the flippant jibe of a complacent ignoramus. It is to The Scotsman's shame that it encourages the kind of mentality that sees religion as an issue to be spoken of on that level.

J DERRICK MCCLURE
Rosehill Terrace
Aberdeen

This week, among other things:

1. I have been referred to as a complacent ignoramus in the pages of a major national newspaper.
2. 15,000 people have watched a film I'm in. Most of them have liked it.
3. I have been endorsed by respected Hollywood actors.
4. Largely as a result of my continuing ministrations, my crippled girlfriend has been allowed to live some semblance of a life.

So I am less than overwhelmingly concerned about the opinion of some twit in Aberdeen as it pertains to item (1) above. It's important, as scotm says, to maintain a sense of perspective.

Nonetheless, I am having some fun. I get very little time to myself often (largely as a result of item (4) above), and there are very few hobbies I can pursue from my desk at work. I am fully aware that this world can do better than me as a champion, probably: I just do the best that I can.

Thus:

What, I wonder, is more flippant? Referring to the Christian god as invisible (which he demonstrably is) and imaginary (which he almost certainly is, since the sole account of his existence is from a single book written thousands of years ago, when journalistic standards were much more lax than now)? Or decrying as an ``ignoramus'' (Letters, 29 October) one who simply sees the world in a different way?

What is more complacent? Looking at the world, questioning, and seeking independent corroboration of the stories we were told and Sunday school, persistently failing to find it, and so drawing one's own conclusions? Or seeing a man who has done so and instantly hurtling to the conclusion that he is stupid and evil simply because he does not follow the same imaginary invisible friend in the sky as oneself.

The Scotsman should be given credit for allowing both sides of the debate. However, it is with the same noble intentions that the newspaper encourages (celibate) priests to moralize about the sexual health of all women (Burning Issue, 25 October) in a country that is almost half secular.

The inevitable protests squawked out by the religious few in response to legitimate criticism smack of denial that, in the new rational age, their centuries-long grip on society is beginning to slip. I would urge the editors and readers of The Scotsman to give an appropriate level of credence to their hysterical ad hominem attacks.

And now I'm feeling a little better, whether they print it or not. I have no intention of turning into Mr Angry from Tunbridge Wells, but at least I'm keeping myself occupied.

And the alternative is trolling people on the Internet, which, as we all know, is pathetic, evil and wrong.