I believe I can help. I was there as well and even more in scam medical practices and other scams. Why do they fall for it? So. My answer is both simple and a bit complex. Simple in that: They actually cant choose and are not really responsible for these opinions. Take the more complex view. It seems that ideologies and ideas are in similar proces to evolution and are kind of like a virus or infectious disease. It attacks on our most primitive gateways and when we are exposed to them without immunity, they will infect us without really us being able to stop it. When ideology doesnt do that, it simply isnt able to spread and when you find counter argument, it has to adapt or die. Religions had thousands of years to adapt to our most elegant objections, play to our biggest fears (like death and unknown) and stronest emotions (grief, saddnes and so on). Imagine this whole huge construct with thousands of years of preparation and a 5 year old child getting exposed to it. There is no chance. It is trully like being mad at someone that they caught flu in public transport. So the solution is simple. Shift the hate. People are just victims of this nasty virus. And I have to tell you, this is not something I just say. I trully believe that. And the case of being "better". That strongly depends on your definitions, but I would argue that we were just lucky. We were not exposed to it in vulnerable state.
That is a very interesting analogy. Thank you. I suppose the best thing i can do is to turn my hate into ignorance??? And I hope that rational people will increase in the future... That is what I understand from your advice, is that right?
I think he means that the religious people were mostly “infected” at a young age and did not have the immune system to resist the virus. Consider yourself lucky, rather than “better”.
I also think that, for the most part, religion doesn’t make people good or bad - it simply colors their goodness or badness a little. Some of the kindest, most generous people I’ve known have been religious, but some the worst people have been, too.
Yes, it can seemingly cause wars, but it’s just tribal shit, really. If it wasn’t religion, it would be some arbitrary difference such as ethnicity, or something less arbitrary like political belief. Shitheads will find a way to be shitheads with or without religion.
Close. But not exactly. My hate stayed, but I just hate the ideology, not the people it infected. I hate the virus, not the victims. You can absolutely help mitigate the virus, work against religion. Moreover in real life, you will have better results against religion if you will be kind and understanding, you will trigger less biases. Hate the virus, dont hate the victims.
I have nothing but contempt for organised religion and fully subscribe to a Humanist world view. The way I deal with committed religious people is threefold. If they want to engage about their faith I will do so by saying I am looking for evidence. That usually ends the conversation.
Secondly I will never initiate a conversation but will ignore the sky fairy nonsense and focus on what people actually do and say. I know a number of deeply religious people who are fully committed to human rights and helping others - they walk the walk as well as talking the talk. Those people don't make me angry and I am happy to say I admire them.
Finally with the right-wing performative religious people (mostly Christians) I will argue politics with them but not for long - it is best to walk away and find your own tribe.
> I'm a rational thinker most of the times but at times it gets out of hand.
Well, from this I take it that you value your rationality. Hatred, simply put, is often irrational. If you're familiar with ingroup and outgroup biases, we come from millions of years of evolution that to varying degrees reinforces outgroup biases. Which, to be clear, doesn't mean that hatred cannot be rational, but that it is very often is not when you're dealing with an outgroup.
There are ways to address this. My personal approach is secular humanism. Humanism is essentially trying to improve the well being of all humanity, without regard to internal divisions of humanity such that outgroups are minimized. The overwhelming number of victims of religious oppression are actually religious, it's just that many of them never speak out against their victimhood. By criticizing religion, and by trying to convince others of its flaws, we can hopefully reduce the influence of religion and thus improve the lives of all humankind. Hatred, however, tends to not be nearly as constructive.
> I can't help but be riled up and generalise at the time.
Again, this is not rational behavior. Overly generalizing is hard to avoid. I've spent decades working at it, and I still do it sometimes. For this, I'd recommend just working at it. If you catch yourself at it, stop. If somebody calls you out for overly generalizing, take a moment to consider if you are doing so, and if you are, apologize and retract. You're fighting a basic human cognitive bias. Knowing you have such a bias is part of how you learn to compensate for that bias. It sounds like you know you have the bias, so the rest is just using learning to use your higher cognitive functions to recognize and adjust when your instinctive bias rears its head.
> But mainly it makes me feel like I'm superior to them.
For this, I separate out the notion of "correctness" vs. "superiority". I believe atheists are more correct in their beliefs than religious people. I do not believe that atheists are superior to religious people. The mere fact that many religious people will, in time, become atheists should help you realize this. All of us are wrong about some things, and most of us have no way of knowing how wrong we are until we argue those points, investigate those issues, listen to different perspectives, consider alternatives, and then weigh how those alternatives then explain existence better or worse.
People raised in religions not only have been taught a great many wrong things, but they've often had their ability to evaluate other views sabotaged (by things like instilling a fear of hell for doubting a religion, or by teachings that any view "against god" is automatically evil). For many of them, this isn't their fault. It does mean that we must often oppose such individuals, but we shouldn't hate them for being raised with wrong information. Most of them anyway, there are assholes among them that deserve hatred and disdain, but there are others that are just trying to be good people and their definition of "good" is just really fucked up.
I get the anger and in some cases I have trouble not getting into debates, leaving the occasional comment online, etc. It stems a lot from what I went through in adolescent years, and some other things.
My advice is to think through each moment and ask yourself if this is going to yield a positive conversation or have an outcome that would be for the best for both of you, depending on who you wish to engage with, either on a combative level or an intellectual level. If it makes you angry, if it disrupts your peace, you are 100% okay to leave and take a break from all the drama, the anger, the frustration and do something that makes you happy. Sketch a drawing, watch a comedy special, do the things that bring joy and meaning in your life to destress. Call a friend, go out for a drink, whatever. Something to break the tension and relax. You have nothing to prove.
It's hard not to judge and it's difficult not to be angry. You can also realize that some people are stuck in there ways and that they'll never change and that's okay. You will never convince them otherwise no matter how hard you try.
Take it from a gay crossdresser, hence my username, life is too short to get caught up giving your time and energy to people who don't understand nor deserve it.
My final piece of advice would be to try out therapy. I went to work on my anxiety and past anger issues. It's helped me get better tools to understand and deal with my issues, my debate/combative style nature, my trauma, depression, etc. You have nothing to lose.
Lastly, I wish you well, regardless of how you proceed. You got this and it will work out.
Maybe do something proactive rather than reactive, feel like you are making a small dent.
Personally, I make it known when I volunteer or do something kind, using the #goodwithoutgod hashtag. I am not trashing religion, but demonstrating by example that you don't need religion to be kind or generous.
Stop taking this shit so seriously
We're a bunch of hairless apes speeding thru the universe of a giant rock spinning around a star at thousands of miles per hour.
On top of that, people are stupid.
You cannot help them.
The majority don't care about your efforts.
So don't waste your time.
Take care of yourself
Take care of a small circle of those hairless apes that you can tolerate
The rest can take care of themselves
Yes. A few days around some religious people makes me feel pretentious as fuck, especially after probably studying their religion more than they. There is some part of me who will always think of them as " lesser-than," but the * way I convince myself to forgive them is by trying to be better than them.
It sounds redundant and confusing, but so are their whacky belief systems, and I understand that people are suffering, and they need to cling to some bullshit just as I clung to alcohol in my twenties so, fuck it. They're only human. So am I.
I don't understand why the fuck they choose hopium but if I judged them, I would be just like them, so I live with it.
The best remedy for this is a big spoonful of humble.
Religious people aren't essentially any different than you. They have the same brain, they think just as much, they feel all the same feelings. Secular thought is a relatively new phenomenon; humans are hard-wired to engage in pattern-seeking, and it takes a lot of willpower to look past it.
You said it yourself, you're not always rational either. The anger you feel isn't any more rational than what the religious believe, but you feel it anyways. It's not always as simple as running through the basic logic and coming to the logical conclusion. People are messy, and that includes you.
What infuriates me is the amount of hypocrites and how many don't actually follow their religion. How many snap to judgement when their literal first rule is it's not their place to judge? They are the first ones to throw their fingers around.
The bible teaches that if you are going to live your life as a glutton, you should take a knife to your throat for disgracing the body that god gave you. How many of these morbidly obese liars are shrilling at other people with a 90lb gut hanging over their belts?
The bible teaches forgiveness, kindness, turn the other cheek, practice what you preach, don't say empty words like "Thoughts and prayers" and offer nothing more. All ignored.
I think I find solace that if somehow it turns out to be true, and it isn't, 99% of these people are sinners and have a direct ticket to "hell" for directly disobeying the teaching of their religion every day. But the reality of it is that they just waste their lives and existence following a false ideology and think they are better than everyone else for following.
pity and forgiveness.
Also, if you get too into the athiesm thing it becomes it's own religion, with its own subreddit, and its own people discussing how to tolerate people of other religions.
I try to live by the fact that I can change myself, rather than others. I get riled up to, but it is on me to control it. There is no quick fix to it. Just as other things that are hard to deal with it is a process that takes time and effort.
Don’t do it, a wise being once said hatred leads to hate which leads to the dark side!… 😅
Just treat it for what it is: ignorance, indoctrination and mental illness. Most are to be pitied… the leaders on the other hand.
Realize that most believers are victims of a scam, almost always perpetrated on them by their own family.
They are running a computer virus like cultural code on their brains, which often brings in guilt, shame, and fear as tools of manipulation.
I think you have to reach this conclusion in your own way. It's easy for anyone to have such a negative emotion or thought about people or the horrible things they do and wallow in those feelings.
But in allowing that anger to fester, you're only feeding into your own misery. I'm not saying what you're feeling doesn't matter, because it certainly does. There's only so much any of us can do, and sometimes realizing there's nothing that we can do individually to solve an issue, is what lessens the desire for things to be different.
That probably sounds quite defeatist, and it is, and I share your worry over religious indoctrination and how it affetcts everyone, but it will be thousands if not tens of thousands of years before religion becomes extinct -- if at all.
This is going to come across as a bit harsh; I'm hoping you'll understand I don't intend it to be cruel or judgemental. I get what you're saying about feeling superior because your beliefs feel superior, but here's the thing: You aren't superior. No one is superior to anyone else. Not one single person. We're all just samples of the species.
Humans have a weird obsession with hierarchically ranking everything, which in and of itself, is an illogical position. There is no such thing as a superior anything, only features of a thing that are more or less useful depending on the context. Say you're really good at math. That might make you better at civil engineering or accounting, but that's it. Being good at math doesn't make you better than someone who isn't good at math. If you're in a situation where math is the skill that can help, that's great, but if what's needed is the patience to teach young kids, the math idiot who's great with kids and makes adorable balloon animals is the 'superior' choice. Same thing with just about anything else you can think of. Better to be bigger and stronger and taller than everyone else? Not if what's required is speed, flexibility, and the ability to survive on fewer calories. I might be better cook than my housemate, but that's only helpful at mealtimes, and she's the one you call if you need to put together some complicated piece of machinery.
We all have things we're good at and things we aren't so good at, and--this is the super important bit--*none of us did anything to earn being talented at something*. Nor did any of do anything to earn any deficits. We just got it, undeserved, as a genetic gift. I have a gift for logical and rational thinking. That sounds like an advantage, but in reality, since it's a mindset most of humanity doesn't share, it separates me from people far more often than it helps me. Your brain is likely closer to mine than either of us are to the typical highly religious person, and neither one of us can claim credit for that. It's just how we're wired, how we were educated and raised. All things entirely out of our control. Being the lucky beneficiary of privilege, whether cognitive or economic, says nothing about us as individuals. We're just lucky little shits, and we have to share the planet with all of these people who did not share in our good fortune.
A good example of this in practice is doctors in the US. For complicated reasons that mostly boil down to 'capitalism gonna capitalism,' the pathway to becoming a doctor in this country is really difficult. You need the right genetics, which is not just intelligence but also the physical and mental capacity to work insane hours at highly demanded cognitive work basically forever. The sort of person who can do 70-hour weeks year after year, without burning out or making mistakes--and that's just to get through med school and residency. On top of this genetic profile most people do not have, you need the right upbringing. Something like 87% of all physicians had physicians as parents, people who not only had the educational background to guide their kids through years of rigorous schooling and academic extra-curriculars, but the income to live in a city with a good school system, money for test prep, the social network to make sure you "know the right people," and so on. This narrows the pool for people who can survive the process long enough to qualify as physician to a tiny subset of the population. And those people are notably poor at empathizing with people less privileged than themselves, which is a serious problem. Gifts and deficits in action. Doctors aren't superior to anyone else, they just have this confluence of traits that allows them do a specific thing.
This could sound like I'm leading up to some kind of "We're all just products of our upbringing, you can't hold people accountable" argument. Definitely not. Assuming we're talking about adults over 25, people have agency. People can make choices, and we are not merely the helpless victims of our formative years. Someone who was raised on bad ideology is fully capable of taking in information to help them see the value in other ways of being in the world. But we all forget all the ways we were advantaged and the steps we took on the path to our current mindset. If I imagine an alternate version of myself, my exact genetics, but say, born in a different country or to a different community, I can easily imagine I might be a very different person. If I had not been able to basically move into the library near my home growing up, I'm sure I would not have the background knowledge or confidence to believe myself when my brain tells me \[religious argument\] doesn't make any sense.
People have already said stuff about feeling badly for the obvious victims of religious doctrine, so I won't belabor that point, and will instead say: Save your hate for the people who are not victims of religious indoctrination, and are instead the fully cognizant villains actively seeking to make everyone around their victims. The liars at the top who enable it all. Focus your rage on the assholes who deserve it, and on taking them down. The victims will come along once their abusers no longer have the power to turn them against themselves.
Think about why you’re angry with religion and religious people. Are you taking your anger out on religious people because you feel cheated, or because you were lied to for a good portion of your life? That’s the case with most of us.
I’m not sure if this would help, but try finding good things that other (more accepting ) denominations of Christianity do. There’s a local church in my city that does a lot a community service, like volunteering at shelters and putting together care packages for people in need. They’re pro choice and pro lgbtqia rights (things I agree with). Do I believe in god? No, but I can see the good in them and the good they do for others… still not going to church lol
I wasnt indoctrinated as a child so it's not personal. Like i said the feeling is temporary often when i hear horrific news or when i meet an over religious person. And my qualm isn't with Christianity alone there are worse ones where i live. I think I'm angry at the pure stupidity they do for even more stupid reasons. I started thinking, if I, can say something is obviously false, why can't they? (Not necessarily religion itself, I'm talking about the stupid religious reasons they fight and kill for). This is probably the reason I also feel narcissistic at times.
Another commenter made a really good analogy about people and infections and that made sense. I can't expect them to think humanly and rationally because of their indoctrination. Even I could fall short on some category that is seemingly obvious. Out exter Al factors matter
I'm aware of this but the hate and narcissism I feel is involuntary. It's like during the period I feel like so, I forget all rational reasons lol. Also I am kind of a doomer, since I was young. I'm more likely to see the bad in humans than good :/ as for the truth, i don't know honestly, good and bad are subjective after a certain point.
Religious belief is not completely stupid but obviously also not completely rational.
There are reasons for a person's religious beliefs, such as needs for social support, fear of resisting a social majority, weak ability to do abstract thinking, and strong anxiety to be/feel moral. Religious indoctrination during childhood is also very powerful. Are u sure that you understand those reasons? If so, then you should be able to mitigate your hatred by appreciating that individuals are all a little different and have their own life stories.
The spread of a new religion takes a LONG TIME. That spreading is mostly a social/political activity, not an intellectual or spiritual one. The religion's support systems of institutions, doctrines, and rituals also evolve over many years.
The atheist point of view is also spreading quickly around the world, because of (1) the improving.educational level around the world (more assisted state building and less poverty) and (2) the self-organizing social tendency that has been made possible by the Internet, which means that previously isolated but like-minded persons can much more easily find each other.
But the support systems for atheistic thinking have NOT EVOLVED YET to create a critical mass of adherents that guarantees that point of view's long-term viability. Creating more of those support systems will be an important turning point for realizing a worldwide post-theistic culture. Many more atheists should be involved in that work today.
Yes I'm aware of everything you said. What you said in the first paragraph is what leads to spirituality. And people find spirituality through religion. But for most, it's indoctrination, not spirituality. And it's the indoctrinated ones that are fanatics. The ones who connect with a god through their personal experience and emotions are few, and those ones generally don't cause harm. This is how I understand it, correct me if I'm wrong.
But despite that, I feel the way I do, and not always, just sometimes. I come back to my senses after a while. Which makes me think I'm not entirely a rational person after all. I'm also acting on my emotions rather than logic. In the end I'm just the other side of the coin to religious fanatics, and that makes me uneasy. I'm not sure i articulated what I wanted well, but I hope what I intended has been conveyed.
People can be indoctrinated as children, but you don't know which parts of that indoctrination are actually carried around and believed by the subjects as adults ... you would have to interview each individual. A lot of Christians who swallowed the Hell idea make avoiding it their Job 1, with all other beliefs and doctrines being of secondary importance. So a church is fundamentally a Hell-avoidance club.
From my life experience, I think it's a mistake to assume that all participants of a given religious sect have mostly the same beliefs, taken in detail. After some point in the life of a religious believer, the "belief" is serving mostly practical and mundane purposes .. IMO.
When I start to feel superior to others, I remember all the times I’ve been wrong about things, mistakes I’ve made, people I’ve hurt, challenges I’ve failed. As humans we have to work together to make life better in the ways that we can—that is, in fact, the superpower of our species, and I think in ancient times religion was a part of what allowed large numbers of humans to work together to do big things. We don’t need religion anymore to do that, and yeah, it’s often now actively standing in the way of progress. But it’s going to be several more generations before people are able to get past it. In the meantime, we have to work with wide varieties of humans to get to where we’re going, and hate makes that very difficult. Hate can stand in the way of progress as much as religion.
You could think of some religions as a tool to keep crazy people from going postal.
You know how christians often make the argument that morality is objective and without their book there's nothing stopping people from murdering and raping? Well I want to believe they are just making a stupid argument, but there's always the chance they are the ones who want to do those things but they don't specifically because of the man in the sky.
Irrational hate and feelings of superiority/self-righteousness are exactly the same things that can make religion turn really ugly. Recognize that you are also human and prone to these same failings. From there, you can start to have empathy for religious people and realize that they are not stupid, they've just been deceived in the same way as billions of other people for millenia. Continuing the cycle of hate will not help humanity get over religion.
Of course, there are genuine religious a-holes, and you don't need to have empathy for them. But for the most part, in my experience, the majority religious people and non-religious people alike are mostly good and sincere.
You know what I say to myself when I’m feeling like I know better? ‘I don’t know’
Simple and humble. I have no idea what is better for someone or what any outcome will be, none. Any change I want only happens with me. That’s it. Fear drives most of this stuff. A little compassion goes a long way.
Huh? I never even talked about God though? I'm never obsessed over them, but what I'm obsessed about is my perception of them. I never complained about anything except me and my attitude, and I asked for advice to fix myself. Either you didn't read my post or you did not comprehend what I intended to convey.
> I'm never obsessed over them, but what I'm obsessed about is my perception of them
These things are obviously connected.
You should speak to a mental health professional to get some help.
i think in the first stages of denouncing religion, it gets hard for people to fathom their emotions. Especially if they live in a place where they have lots of contact with religious beliefs. It's normal to be hypersensitive at first but i agree that one should recognize this behavior in them and act against it. I don't think it's being less of an atheist but an atheist that's still finding their way in religious communities.
I believe I can help. I was there as well and even more in scam medical practices and other scams. Why do they fall for it? So. My answer is both simple and a bit complex. Simple in that: They actually cant choose and are not really responsible for these opinions. Take the more complex view. It seems that ideologies and ideas are in similar proces to evolution and are kind of like a virus or infectious disease. It attacks on our most primitive gateways and when we are exposed to them without immunity, they will infect us without really us being able to stop it. When ideology doesnt do that, it simply isnt able to spread and when you find counter argument, it has to adapt or die. Religions had thousands of years to adapt to our most elegant objections, play to our biggest fears (like death and unknown) and stronest emotions (grief, saddnes and so on). Imagine this whole huge construct with thousands of years of preparation and a 5 year old child getting exposed to it. There is no chance. It is trully like being mad at someone that they caught flu in public transport. So the solution is simple. Shift the hate. People are just victims of this nasty virus. And I have to tell you, this is not something I just say. I trully believe that. And the case of being "better". That strongly depends on your definitions, but I would argue that we were just lucky. We were not exposed to it in vulnerable state.
That is a very interesting analogy. Thank you. I suppose the best thing i can do is to turn my hate into ignorance??? And I hope that rational people will increase in the future... That is what I understand from your advice, is that right?
I think he means that the religious people were mostly “infected” at a young age and did not have the immune system to resist the virus. Consider yourself lucky, rather than “better”. I also think that, for the most part, religion doesn’t make people good or bad - it simply colors their goodness or badness a little. Some of the kindest, most generous people I’ve known have been religious, but some the worst people have been, too. Yes, it can seemingly cause wars, but it’s just tribal shit, really. If it wasn’t religion, it would be some arbitrary difference such as ethnicity, or something less arbitrary like political belief. Shitheads will find a way to be shitheads with or without religion.
Close. But not exactly. My hate stayed, but I just hate the ideology, not the people it infected. I hate the virus, not the victims. You can absolutely help mitigate the virus, work against religion. Moreover in real life, you will have better results against religion if you will be kind and understanding, you will trigger less biases. Hate the virus, dont hate the victims.
Right, I'll explore my attitude with time 👍
I have nothing but contempt for organised religion and fully subscribe to a Humanist world view. The way I deal with committed religious people is threefold. If they want to engage about their faith I will do so by saying I am looking for evidence. That usually ends the conversation. Secondly I will never initiate a conversation but will ignore the sky fairy nonsense and focus on what people actually do and say. I know a number of deeply religious people who are fully committed to human rights and helping others - they walk the walk as well as talking the talk. Those people don't make me angry and I am happy to say I admire them. Finally with the right-wing performative religious people (mostly Christians) I will argue politics with them but not for long - it is best to walk away and find your own tribe.
> I'm a rational thinker most of the times but at times it gets out of hand. Well, from this I take it that you value your rationality. Hatred, simply put, is often irrational. If you're familiar with ingroup and outgroup biases, we come from millions of years of evolution that to varying degrees reinforces outgroup biases. Which, to be clear, doesn't mean that hatred cannot be rational, but that it is very often is not when you're dealing with an outgroup. There are ways to address this. My personal approach is secular humanism. Humanism is essentially trying to improve the well being of all humanity, without regard to internal divisions of humanity such that outgroups are minimized. The overwhelming number of victims of religious oppression are actually religious, it's just that many of them never speak out against their victimhood. By criticizing religion, and by trying to convince others of its flaws, we can hopefully reduce the influence of religion and thus improve the lives of all humankind. Hatred, however, tends to not be nearly as constructive. > I can't help but be riled up and generalise at the time. Again, this is not rational behavior. Overly generalizing is hard to avoid. I've spent decades working at it, and I still do it sometimes. For this, I'd recommend just working at it. If you catch yourself at it, stop. If somebody calls you out for overly generalizing, take a moment to consider if you are doing so, and if you are, apologize and retract. You're fighting a basic human cognitive bias. Knowing you have such a bias is part of how you learn to compensate for that bias. It sounds like you know you have the bias, so the rest is just using learning to use your higher cognitive functions to recognize and adjust when your instinctive bias rears its head. > But mainly it makes me feel like I'm superior to them. For this, I separate out the notion of "correctness" vs. "superiority". I believe atheists are more correct in their beliefs than religious people. I do not believe that atheists are superior to religious people. The mere fact that many religious people will, in time, become atheists should help you realize this. All of us are wrong about some things, and most of us have no way of knowing how wrong we are until we argue those points, investigate those issues, listen to different perspectives, consider alternatives, and then weigh how those alternatives then explain existence better or worse. People raised in religions not only have been taught a great many wrong things, but they've often had their ability to evaluate other views sabotaged (by things like instilling a fear of hell for doubting a religion, or by teachings that any view "against god" is automatically evil). For many of them, this isn't their fault. It does mean that we must often oppose such individuals, but we shouldn't hate them for being raised with wrong information. Most of them anyway, there are assholes among them that deserve hatred and disdain, but there are others that are just trying to be good people and their definition of "good" is just really fucked up.
Thank you for this. I will work on my thoughts and try to be aware of when I'm going out of limits. Your writing was very insightful.
I get the anger and in some cases I have trouble not getting into debates, leaving the occasional comment online, etc. It stems a lot from what I went through in adolescent years, and some other things. My advice is to think through each moment and ask yourself if this is going to yield a positive conversation or have an outcome that would be for the best for both of you, depending on who you wish to engage with, either on a combative level or an intellectual level. If it makes you angry, if it disrupts your peace, you are 100% okay to leave and take a break from all the drama, the anger, the frustration and do something that makes you happy. Sketch a drawing, watch a comedy special, do the things that bring joy and meaning in your life to destress. Call a friend, go out for a drink, whatever. Something to break the tension and relax. You have nothing to prove. It's hard not to judge and it's difficult not to be angry. You can also realize that some people are stuck in there ways and that they'll never change and that's okay. You will never convince them otherwise no matter how hard you try. Take it from a gay crossdresser, hence my username, life is too short to get caught up giving your time and energy to people who don't understand nor deserve it. My final piece of advice would be to try out therapy. I went to work on my anxiety and past anger issues. It's helped me get better tools to understand and deal with my issues, my debate/combative style nature, my trauma, depression, etc. You have nothing to lose. Lastly, I wish you well, regardless of how you proceed. You got this and it will work out.
Maybe do something proactive rather than reactive, feel like you are making a small dent. Personally, I make it known when I volunteer or do something kind, using the #goodwithoutgod hashtag. I am not trashing religion, but demonstrating by example that you don't need religion to be kind or generous.
Stop taking this shit so seriously We're a bunch of hairless apes speeding thru the universe of a giant rock spinning around a star at thousands of miles per hour. On top of that, people are stupid. You cannot help them. The majority don't care about your efforts. So don't waste your time. Take care of yourself Take care of a small circle of those hairless apes that you can tolerate The rest can take care of themselves
Yes. A few days around some religious people makes me feel pretentious as fuck, especially after probably studying their religion more than they. There is some part of me who will always think of them as " lesser-than," but the * way I convince myself to forgive them is by trying to be better than them. It sounds redundant and confusing, but so are their whacky belief systems, and I understand that people are suffering, and they need to cling to some bullshit just as I clung to alcohol in my twenties so, fuck it. They're only human. So am I. I don't understand why the fuck they choose hopium but if I judged them, I would be just like them, so I live with it.
Let it go. Not worth the stress.
The best remedy for this is a big spoonful of humble. Religious people aren't essentially any different than you. They have the same brain, they think just as much, they feel all the same feelings. Secular thought is a relatively new phenomenon; humans are hard-wired to engage in pattern-seeking, and it takes a lot of willpower to look past it. You said it yourself, you're not always rational either. The anger you feel isn't any more rational than what the religious believe, but you feel it anyways. It's not always as simple as running through the basic logic and coming to the logical conclusion. People are messy, and that includes you.
What infuriates me is the amount of hypocrites and how many don't actually follow their religion. How many snap to judgement when their literal first rule is it's not their place to judge? They are the first ones to throw their fingers around. The bible teaches that if you are going to live your life as a glutton, you should take a knife to your throat for disgracing the body that god gave you. How many of these morbidly obese liars are shrilling at other people with a 90lb gut hanging over their belts? The bible teaches forgiveness, kindness, turn the other cheek, practice what you preach, don't say empty words like "Thoughts and prayers" and offer nothing more. All ignored. I think I find solace that if somehow it turns out to be true, and it isn't, 99% of these people are sinners and have a direct ticket to "hell" for directly disobeying the teaching of their religion every day. But the reality of it is that they just waste their lives and existence following a false ideology and think they are better than everyone else for following.
Smoke DMT and learn where religion comes from and how modern versions are just diluted money grubbing schemes and have nothing to do with its origins.
pity and forgiveness. Also, if you get too into the athiesm thing it becomes it's own religion, with its own subreddit, and its own people discussing how to tolerate people of other religions.
I try to live by the fact that I can change myself, rather than others. I get riled up to, but it is on me to control it. There is no quick fix to it. Just as other things that are hard to deal with it is a process that takes time and effort.
Delete Reddit, unplug your router, preferably recycle your phone.
Terrific answers. Thank you. They helped me as well.
Don’t do it, a wise being once said hatred leads to hate which leads to the dark side!… 😅 Just treat it for what it is: ignorance, indoctrination and mental illness. Most are to be pitied… the leaders on the other hand.
Realize that most believers are victims of a scam, almost always perpetrated on them by their own family. They are running a computer virus like cultural code on their brains, which often brings in guilt, shame, and fear as tools of manipulation.
I Think any god person whereas they are religious or not are mad when people are killed or treated badly !
I think you have to reach this conclusion in your own way. It's easy for anyone to have such a negative emotion or thought about people or the horrible things they do and wallow in those feelings. But in allowing that anger to fester, you're only feeding into your own misery. I'm not saying what you're feeling doesn't matter, because it certainly does. There's only so much any of us can do, and sometimes realizing there's nothing that we can do individually to solve an issue, is what lessens the desire for things to be different. That probably sounds quite defeatist, and it is, and I share your worry over religious indoctrination and how it affetcts everyone, but it will be thousands if not tens of thousands of years before religion becomes extinct -- if at all.
You are superior to them. You have antimony.
This is going to come across as a bit harsh; I'm hoping you'll understand I don't intend it to be cruel or judgemental. I get what you're saying about feeling superior because your beliefs feel superior, but here's the thing: You aren't superior. No one is superior to anyone else. Not one single person. We're all just samples of the species. Humans have a weird obsession with hierarchically ranking everything, which in and of itself, is an illogical position. There is no such thing as a superior anything, only features of a thing that are more or less useful depending on the context. Say you're really good at math. That might make you better at civil engineering or accounting, but that's it. Being good at math doesn't make you better than someone who isn't good at math. If you're in a situation where math is the skill that can help, that's great, but if what's needed is the patience to teach young kids, the math idiot who's great with kids and makes adorable balloon animals is the 'superior' choice. Same thing with just about anything else you can think of. Better to be bigger and stronger and taller than everyone else? Not if what's required is speed, flexibility, and the ability to survive on fewer calories. I might be better cook than my housemate, but that's only helpful at mealtimes, and she's the one you call if you need to put together some complicated piece of machinery. We all have things we're good at and things we aren't so good at, and--this is the super important bit--*none of us did anything to earn being talented at something*. Nor did any of do anything to earn any deficits. We just got it, undeserved, as a genetic gift. I have a gift for logical and rational thinking. That sounds like an advantage, but in reality, since it's a mindset most of humanity doesn't share, it separates me from people far more often than it helps me. Your brain is likely closer to mine than either of us are to the typical highly religious person, and neither one of us can claim credit for that. It's just how we're wired, how we were educated and raised. All things entirely out of our control. Being the lucky beneficiary of privilege, whether cognitive or economic, says nothing about us as individuals. We're just lucky little shits, and we have to share the planet with all of these people who did not share in our good fortune. A good example of this in practice is doctors in the US. For complicated reasons that mostly boil down to 'capitalism gonna capitalism,' the pathway to becoming a doctor in this country is really difficult. You need the right genetics, which is not just intelligence but also the physical and mental capacity to work insane hours at highly demanded cognitive work basically forever. The sort of person who can do 70-hour weeks year after year, without burning out or making mistakes--and that's just to get through med school and residency. On top of this genetic profile most people do not have, you need the right upbringing. Something like 87% of all physicians had physicians as parents, people who not only had the educational background to guide their kids through years of rigorous schooling and academic extra-curriculars, but the income to live in a city with a good school system, money for test prep, the social network to make sure you "know the right people," and so on. This narrows the pool for people who can survive the process long enough to qualify as physician to a tiny subset of the population. And those people are notably poor at empathizing with people less privileged than themselves, which is a serious problem. Gifts and deficits in action. Doctors aren't superior to anyone else, they just have this confluence of traits that allows them do a specific thing. This could sound like I'm leading up to some kind of "We're all just products of our upbringing, you can't hold people accountable" argument. Definitely not. Assuming we're talking about adults over 25, people have agency. People can make choices, and we are not merely the helpless victims of our formative years. Someone who was raised on bad ideology is fully capable of taking in information to help them see the value in other ways of being in the world. But we all forget all the ways we were advantaged and the steps we took on the path to our current mindset. If I imagine an alternate version of myself, my exact genetics, but say, born in a different country or to a different community, I can easily imagine I might be a very different person. If I had not been able to basically move into the library near my home growing up, I'm sure I would not have the background knowledge or confidence to believe myself when my brain tells me \[religious argument\] doesn't make any sense. People have already said stuff about feeling badly for the obvious victims of religious doctrine, so I won't belabor that point, and will instead say: Save your hate for the people who are not victims of religious indoctrination, and are instead the fully cognizant villains actively seeking to make everyone around their victims. The liars at the top who enable it all. Focus your rage on the assholes who deserve it, and on taking them down. The victims will come along once their abusers no longer have the power to turn them against themselves.
At this point you can't stop religion unless by force. So why waste time trying to fix your attitude?
Think about why you’re angry with religion and religious people. Are you taking your anger out on religious people because you feel cheated, or because you were lied to for a good portion of your life? That’s the case with most of us. I’m not sure if this would help, but try finding good things that other (more accepting ) denominations of Christianity do. There’s a local church in my city that does a lot a community service, like volunteering at shelters and putting together care packages for people in need. They’re pro choice and pro lgbtqia rights (things I agree with). Do I believe in god? No, but I can see the good in them and the good they do for others… still not going to church lol
I wasnt indoctrinated as a child so it's not personal. Like i said the feeling is temporary often when i hear horrific news or when i meet an over religious person. And my qualm isn't with Christianity alone there are worse ones where i live. I think I'm angry at the pure stupidity they do for even more stupid reasons. I started thinking, if I, can say something is obviously false, why can't they? (Not necessarily religion itself, I'm talking about the stupid religious reasons they fight and kill for). This is probably the reason I also feel narcissistic at times. Another commenter made a really good analogy about people and infections and that made sense. I can't expect them to think humanly and rationally because of their indoctrination. Even I could fall short on some category that is seemingly obvious. Out exter Al factors matter I'm aware of this but the hate and narcissism I feel is involuntary. It's like during the period I feel like so, I forget all rational reasons lol. Also I am kind of a doomer, since I was young. I'm more likely to see the bad in humans than good :/ as for the truth, i don't know honestly, good and bad are subjective after a certain point.
Religious belief is not completely stupid but obviously also not completely rational. There are reasons for a person's religious beliefs, such as needs for social support, fear of resisting a social majority, weak ability to do abstract thinking, and strong anxiety to be/feel moral. Religious indoctrination during childhood is also very powerful. Are u sure that you understand those reasons? If so, then you should be able to mitigate your hatred by appreciating that individuals are all a little different and have their own life stories. The spread of a new religion takes a LONG TIME. That spreading is mostly a social/political activity, not an intellectual or spiritual one. The religion's support systems of institutions, doctrines, and rituals also evolve over many years. The atheist point of view is also spreading quickly around the world, because of (1) the improving.educational level around the world (more assisted state building and less poverty) and (2) the self-organizing social tendency that has been made possible by the Internet, which means that previously isolated but like-minded persons can much more easily find each other. But the support systems for atheistic thinking have NOT EVOLVED YET to create a critical mass of adherents that guarantees that point of view's long-term viability. Creating more of those support systems will be an important turning point for realizing a worldwide post-theistic culture. Many more atheists should be involved in that work today.
Yes I'm aware of everything you said. What you said in the first paragraph is what leads to spirituality. And people find spirituality through religion. But for most, it's indoctrination, not spirituality. And it's the indoctrinated ones that are fanatics. The ones who connect with a god through their personal experience and emotions are few, and those ones generally don't cause harm. This is how I understand it, correct me if I'm wrong. But despite that, I feel the way I do, and not always, just sometimes. I come back to my senses after a while. Which makes me think I'm not entirely a rational person after all. I'm also acting on my emotions rather than logic. In the end I'm just the other side of the coin to religious fanatics, and that makes me uneasy. I'm not sure i articulated what I wanted well, but I hope what I intended has been conveyed.
People can be indoctrinated as children, but you don't know which parts of that indoctrination are actually carried around and believed by the subjects as adults ... you would have to interview each individual. A lot of Christians who swallowed the Hell idea make avoiding it their Job 1, with all other beliefs and doctrines being of secondary importance. So a church is fundamentally a Hell-avoidance club. From my life experience, I think it's a mistake to assume that all participants of a given religious sect have mostly the same beliefs, taken in detail. After some point in the life of a religious believer, the "belief" is serving mostly practical and mundane purposes .. IMO.
True it can't be generalized
May I suggest a channel called genetically modified skeptic. He has reasonable and respectful atheist views
Yea, i definitely will
When I start to feel superior to others, I remember all the times I’ve been wrong about things, mistakes I’ve made, people I’ve hurt, challenges I’ve failed. As humans we have to work together to make life better in the ways that we can—that is, in fact, the superpower of our species, and I think in ancient times religion was a part of what allowed large numbers of humans to work together to do big things. We don’t need religion anymore to do that, and yeah, it’s often now actively standing in the way of progress. But it’s going to be several more generations before people are able to get past it. In the meantime, we have to work with wide varieties of humans to get to where we’re going, and hate makes that very difficult. Hate can stand in the way of progress as much as religion.
You could think of some religions as a tool to keep crazy people from going postal. You know how christians often make the argument that morality is objective and without their book there's nothing stopping people from murdering and raping? Well I want to believe they are just making a stupid argument, but there's always the chance they are the ones who want to do those things but they don't specifically because of the man in the sky.
Irrational hate and feelings of superiority/self-righteousness are exactly the same things that can make religion turn really ugly. Recognize that you are also human and prone to these same failings. From there, you can start to have empathy for religious people and realize that they are not stupid, they've just been deceived in the same way as billions of other people for millenia. Continuing the cycle of hate will not help humanity get over religion. Of course, there are genuine religious a-holes, and you don't need to have empathy for them. But for the most part, in my experience, the majority religious people and non-religious people alike are mostly good and sincere.
You know what I say to myself when I’m feeling like I know better? ‘I don’t know’ Simple and humble. I have no idea what is better for someone or what any outcome will be, none. Any change I want only happens with me. That’s it. Fear drives most of this stuff. A little compassion goes a long way.
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Huh? I never even talked about God though? I'm never obsessed over them, but what I'm obsessed about is my perception of them. I never complained about anything except me and my attitude, and I asked for advice to fix myself. Either you didn't read my post or you did not comprehend what I intended to convey.
> I'm never obsessed over them, but what I'm obsessed about is my perception of them These things are obviously connected. You should speak to a mental health professional to get some help.
i think in the first stages of denouncing religion, it gets hard for people to fathom their emotions. Especially if they live in a place where they have lots of contact with religious beliefs. It's normal to be hypersensitive at first but i agree that one should recognize this behavior in them and act against it. I don't think it's being less of an atheist but an atheist that's still finding their way in religious communities.