> I should also point out that in this particular case, religion wasn’t the cause of the death. Yes, it was the cause of the original animosity, but Mr. York did not stab Mr. Boa over whether or not macroevolution occurs, or even the reasonableness of believing in a deity.

Didn’t you say yourself that the details were muddy? Where’s the evidence that this was the case?

> Rather, during the religious/science argument, comments were made that Mr. York took as insulting. There apparently was also some animosity toward the other two hogging the booze and the marijuana.

I don’t remember that second part.

> The incident at the tents is muddled,

So how do you know your interpretation is the correct one?

> but there was apparently an exchange of unpleasantries stemming from raised emotions. By this point, the difference of opinions over religious beliefs were secondary to the hostility that had built up on the one hand and the frustration on the other.

Didn’t you just use the phrase “The incident at the tents is muddled”? How do you know that they weren’t still pissed about the religious argument

> It was the exchange of insults that turned into shoving that caused the stabbing,

Let’s get the facts straight. York did BOTH the shoving AND the stabbing. He was the aggressor all the way around, and was not out to defend himself. I find it more probable that York shoved the other guy’s girlfriend while wielding a knife, and he came in to defend her when York stabbed him.

>Mark said:
>> Really? Then why was the evolutionist giving the first shove?
>
>Factually in error, jumping to conclusion from the sketchy news article.

No jumping to conclusion, just factual error.

> The case summary describes that the first physical exchange was the Creationist (York) batting the pizza box out of the girlfriend’s hands and shoving her by the neck to the ground.

Good, we agree on that part.

> Not that it matters, because, as I just explained, the argument by this point was over who was being the bigger jerk.

Wait a second, your whole argument is that he accidentally stabbed someone in defense. But he was the aggressor! He threw the first punch, and somehow that doesn’t matter? Of course it does!

>The Supreme Canuck said:
>> Like the BA says, this could have been over anything. The lesson to take home here is: don’t be a jerk. If we all lived by that rule, the world would be a much nicer place.
>Exactly!

Partially. Find me an instance of someone killing over all the things mentioned above (sports teams, tv stars, etc), and I’ll consider not calling this a ridiculous claim.

>The Centipede said:
>> To believe that it “can’t happen the other way around” is hubris of the highest caliber.
>Especially in this case. The argument was no longer over who was right about the nature of the universe, the argument was over who was the bigger jerk.

Coincidentally, the guy wielding the knife won.

>Mike J said:
>> doesn’t that mean that the evolutionist physically attacked a person who doesn’t “believe” what they believe about origins?
>Nope. See above. Now it’s your prejudices showing.

You forgot the part about how the evolutionist (god I hate that word) didn’t actually do the attacking.

>ross said:
>> I personally would prefer only one degree of murder: life in prison without parole. That’s all there should be, no matter why you killed someone. The fact remains that he killed someone and since he took someone else’s life, his is now worthless

>That’s a very naive and impractical position. What about a person with a spotless driving record hitting a patch of ice and losing control of their car, ending in the death of their passenger? Is that the equivalent of plotting for months and the executing a brutal, weeklong torture and murder of a rival? Either way, someone is dead.

Except that what I was talking about was murder, and what you’re talking about is an accident. I don’t believe for a second that it was an accident that someone who happened to be in a heated argument happened to be holding a knife at just the right position such that the person that he happened to be arguing with happened to just kinda accidentally fall into it. An accident is losing control of your car, making a good faith effort to regain control, and ramming someone and killing them. A murder is getting piss-drunk and then ramming another car full of people killing them because you were too dumbass drunk to control yourself. An accident can be forgiven, and that’s when someone truly means no harm and no ill will to anyone, and was being careful to not cause harm, but a person just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time when someone else made an honest mistake.

It’s entirely plausible that this situation could have played out differently, where the evolution guy actually was the aggressor, and was weilding an iron pan or something charging at the creationist, who had not previously shoved the evo’s gf. He sees this, grabs a knife, and the two proceed to engage in a two-second fight ending in the creationist killing the biologist with a knife. If that were the case, I would have no basis to claim that the religionist should be put in jail forever, and little basis for him going at all. But that’s not what happened. I can’t say for sure, but it appears that the creationist was very much in the wrong and deserves a much worse punishment than he got. And however it played out, I refuse to forgive anyone for anything they did after choosing to consume alcohol. You always have a choice; this guy made the wrong one.

Rather, during the religious/science argument, comments were made that Mr. York took as insulting. There apparently was also some animosity toward the other two hogging the booze and the marijuana. The incident at the tents is muddled, but there was apparently an exchange of unpleasantries stemming from raised emotions. By this point, the difference of opinions over religious beliefs were secondary to the hostility that had built up on the one hand and the frustration on the other. It was the exchange of insults that turned into shoving that caused the stabbing, not any sense of righteousness of position or unwillingness to grant the other person an alternate opinion.

Mark said:
> Really? Then why was the evolutionist giving the first shove?

Factually in error, jumping to conclusion from the sketchy news article. The case summary describes that the first physical exchange was the Creationist (York) batting the pizza box out of the girlfriend’s hands and shoving her by the neck to the ground.

Not that it matters, because, as I just explained, the argument by this point was over who was being the bigger jerk.

The Supreme Canuck said:
> Like the BA says, this could have been over anything. The lesson to take home here is: don’t be a jerk. If we all lived by that rule, the world would be a much nicer place.

Exactly!

The Centipede said:
> To believe that it “can’t happen the other way around” is hubris of the highest caliber.

Especially in this case. The argument was no longer over who was right about the nature of the universe, the argument was over who was the bigger jerk.

Christian X Burnham said:
> What’s ironic about being called Alexander?

What’s funnier? His middle name.

Mike J said:
> doesn’t that mean that the evolutionist physically attacked a person who doesn’t “believe” what they believe about origins?
> this is obviously a microcosm of the state of affairs right now.. creationist and evolutionist attempt to “debate”… the evolutionist goes bonkers when a person refuses to be indoctrinated into this pseudo-scientific-religion called “evolution”.. and attacks the creationist physically since the verbal attempt to manipulate someone into “believing” in a “primordeal soup” usually won’t work on someone who knows the truth about “origins”.

Nope. See above. Now it’s your prejudices showing.

thadd said:
>>“I think the takeaway here is that sometimes it’s better to just let the brick wall be a brick wall. For the evolutionist, this should be easy as there is no god to betray or soul to forfeit over the issue.”

> While it does not apply to me, some people who believe in evolution do believe in god and souls etc.

Yes but irrelevant to the remark. Whether or not the evolutionist believes in a god or a soul, he/she does not believe his god if betrayed or soul is forfeit if he gets the answer wrong. The Creationist, on the other hand, typically justifies position because of belief over what evolution says about his religious state. Ergo, the creationist sees being an evolutionist as rejecting God and thereby endagering his soul.

ross said:
> I personally would prefer only one degree of murder: life in prison without parole. That’s all there should be, no matter why you killed someone. The fact remains that he killed someone and since he took someone else’s life, his is now worthless

That’s a very naive and impractical position. What about a person with a spotless driving record hitting a patch of ice and losing control of their car, ending in the death of their passenger? Is that the equivalent of plotting for months and the executing a brutal, weeklong torture and murder of a rival? Either way, someone is dead.

Thank you to Citizen Z for providing some actual facts. There has been too much conclusion-jumping from both sides based upon a sketchy news report. People are letting their personal biases intrude.

Boosterz said:
> On a serious note, the wacko in the above case only got 5 years for it and was recommended to get out in 3. The moral of the story is if you kill somebody in Australia it helps to be a religious nut. I believe the judge said something along the lines of he thought the defendant “seemed like a good guy”.

Case in point. There is a perception that Mr. York was given leniency because of his religious beliefs. This is an unsupported assertion.

a) There were two accounts given of the altercation: one by Mr York (the accused) and one by Mr. Boa’s girlfriend (the witness). Both parties had been drinking heavily, both were interviewed over time, both were emotionally involved, and perceptions from different parties will be different based upon their own points of view. The judge speaks of evaluating both stories and trying to find the likly truth out of the muddle from both sides. He does say he gives the witness’s account more credit.

b) Mr. York claims he was attacked and defended himself. Just prior to that, he shoved the girlfriend to the ground. Mr. Boa approached Mr. York. It is not clear how aggressive Mr. Boa was in that approach, but it is conceivable Mr. York felt physically threatened.

c) Mr. York reacted by thrusting/shoving out with his hand. He was already holding a knife. Note that he did not pick up the knife for the confrontation, but was previously holding it from cooking/preparing food. The judge notes that as playing a role in his evaluation of the circumstances. Mr. York didn’t set out to stab Mr. Boa, but reacted to an aggressive move.

d) The circumstances of how aggressive Mr. York was in his response are murky. The judge notes that with conflicting views and no way to factually determine the actual situation, he must default to the most lenient interpretation (what with presumption of innocence and all). Ergo, he interprets Mr. York’s response as defensive, not aggressive.

e) Mr. York tried to help afterwards, and expressed remorse. Mr. York also tried to arrange a guilty plea to manslaughter prior to the case going forward, but the Crown (state) rejected that offer. The judge took that into account on sentencing, and discounted the sentence 20 percent.

f) The presumption is that Mr. York’s religious beliefs were the basis of the judge’s determination that he was of good character. There is no evidence to support it. The judge makes no mention of his religious beliefs or practices.

A number of testimonials has been tendered on his behalf from people who know the offender well. They speak eloquently of his good character and his lack of any violent tendencies. I am satisfied that the offender is a person of good character and that this present offence is a complete aberration. He has good prospects of rehabilitation. As I have already said the offence was spontaneous and impulsive and the shocking consequence did not for one moment occur to him.

While it is probable that people mentioned his religious beliefs, there is no evidence the judge took that or weighed it more than statements to his being a nice guy, not generally being violent, etc.

g) The judge specifically notes that it is Mr. York’s first time in prison, that he is far from home and family/friends to visit him. Furthermore, the guy came to the country to work and sight-see, not intending to commit a crime (like drug trafficking). These were all points for consideration of leniency in sentencing.

It is that full string of reasoning, and not any one point, that led the judge to rule on a 5 year sentence, parole in 3 years. There is not any positive evidence to suggest religion played a role in that determination.

Please to not be putting words in my mouth, thank you.”
That was meant as a joke.

“> Religious people have been known to kill for their beliefs.

And this makes them different from, oh, avowedly atheist Communists, such as Che Guevara, how?”
Science is not a belief, religion is. Atheism is not a belief, communism is. Communists kill for their belief in communism just like capitalists kill for their belief in capitalism. To say that a communist atheist killed for his communism to defend communism because he was an atheist is ridiculous. He did it for his communism. Just like if some christian in Iraq killed to defend capitalism/america, I wouldn’t immediately say he killed for christianity.

“What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.”
Depending on the sauce that you’re referring to, that could make the gander gay….

“If you want to suggest that X tends to make people who believe in X kill, then pretty much everyone on the planet has a tendency to kill for whatever ideology they believe firmly in.”
Logical fallacy. X = beliefing in ideology x. Y = killing for ideology. Z = believing in ideology z. X causes Y, therefore Z causes Y. False. Not necessarily true (though, I will give you, also not necessarily false). Also a straw man, because my argument actually was: X has been known to Y. Someone who X’ed, for-sure-partially-Y’ed. Therefore, its entirely plausible that X caused Y, and A didn’t cause Y.

“The problem isn’t with judgment. The problem lies with the immediate assumption of superiority and the intimation that you and people who share your ideology, despite being exactly as human and exactly as fallible as anyone else in the species Homo sapiens sapiens, could never sink so low.”

Except that my assumption wasn’t of superiority, but that religious people kill for religion. As far as I can tell, that’s not an assumption, it’s a proven fact. Given that it’s a fact that people do kill for their religion, it’s plausible that the guy killed for his religion. Given my experience with alcohol, and the bitch-fests that it’s caused, and the stabbings that haven’t happened over other things, I would say that alcohol was not the main catalyst. I won’t deny that it had some role to play, but I also won’t say that we should cut him some slack because he was drunk. “I’m sorry drunk, I was ocifer, and I didn’t see the car that I ran into and killed the passengers of.” Nope, don’t think I’ll dismiss that.

“If you want to give him more than a slap on the wrist, do it because he lacked the self control to avoid murdering someone.”

That’s enough for me.

“Exactly what ideology of his added emotional fuel to a state scientifically proven to decrease inhibitions and exaggerate emotional effects is, as the Doctor pointed out, absolutely irrelevant.”

From a legal standpoint, yeah, it shouldn’t matter why he killed, but I’m not going to dismiss the fact that religious people kill for their religions AND this one killed during a religious argument. I personally would prefer only one degree of murder: life in prison without parole. That’s all there should be, no matter why you killed someone. The fact remains that he killed someone and since he took someone else’s life, his is now worthless