@ossobuco,
Well osso, if you're there--it's like this--The pitchforks and torches jibe does not take account of the mores at the time. It was the form then as lethal injection is now. They had far more inhumane methods of putting people to death in those days. Jesus was expected to live on the cross for three days. Hanging in chains was a longer job. And being hung,drawn and quartered was somewhat more tormenting than most people think.
Now-when atheists take advantage of our modern sensibilities to punishment they are lying and one has to wonder why. There are suicides by setting oneself on fire. One such suicide is thought to have triggered the unrest in the ME. Nobody would attempt to commit suicide in the manner that was inflicted on an attempted assassin of Louis the XIV (I think). His hair colour changed from dark auburn to white in the course of the festivities in the streets of Paris.
In using the false comparison the atheist makes an assumption of ignorance in his/her reader. It is that which ought to concern us all. It seems a general attitude. That everybody is a gump who isn't an atheist. Which is ridiculous.
