There seems to be a general opinion amongst Atheists that they are the victims of severe abuse at the hands of Christians. I invite these who have experienced such abuse by Christians to tell us about it, the situation and the effect of the abuse, as well as the type of Christian(s) and their beliefs, if these facts are known.
Thanks in advance!
4 comments:
I don't know if I'd frame the question as 'severe abuse', You can have minor annoyances and still be justified in complaining about them. I think having 'in god we trust' on our money is a blatant marginalizing of a large swath of Americans, and I'm offended by it, but it's not the most pressing issue today and unlike the likes of right-wing fools like Sean Hannity who compain about the 'war on Christmas', I'd rather deal with more important problems.
I fell away from God when I was 21, my father had recently died, and my Evangelical Step-Grandmother came to visit and began talking about her son who's cancer went into remission and she stated 'God has more for him to do down here.' I, of course, took offense that that had to mean my dad did not. Like most claims of divine intervention, it was half thought out. If something bad happened, not only is it misfortunate, it was also deserved, or God didn't step in because the person wasn't deserving. This seems like a great idea if your lucky, successful, or don't have someone young die, but not for the rest of us.
Some look at a random world as cold and scary, but I see it as comforting. The fact that the majority of us get along day to day is because mankind decided long before religion to band together against the randomness of the world to increase or odds of success. Religion has just been trying to pull us back apart. How can anyone believe in a God who puts his own ego above his creations being nice to each other? Ghandi is being tortured in Hell because he didn't believe in Jesus ? How can you believe in divine intervention and pray for anything other than for God to heal the worst off on the planet?
I'm getting off topic, I don't feel 'severe discrimination' and to frame it that way is condesending. A church near me in New Jersey had 'There are no dead Atheists' on their billboard, how long do you think 'There are no dead christians, Muslims or Jews' would last ? I don't understand people who attack Atheists saying that we think we know it all, just like any religion, atheists fall into a wide spectrum, I don't know if there is a god or not, but I'm more comfortable without one. I do believe that if there is a god, he's not so hung hung up on himself that he cares if I believe in him, if there's order in the universe, it would only matter that I'm a good person, the rest is created by man to get people in the pews.
Arclight
Thank you for your thoughtful response. I do agree that religion is probably its own worst enemy.
I went through a process of logical rejection, starting as a teenager, culminating as a young adult. From the ensuing Atheist viewpoint that I developed, all religious content appeared ridiculous, even laughable. The level I observed from was just a surface level, until I realized that there had to be a high probablity of a first cause.
When I realized that the claim of the documented first cause - aka "deity" - is to be truth, through these two propositions a different viewpoint was introduced to me. If I believe in order and truth, and the first cause is the source of order and truth, then what is left to reject?
What is rejected is the human twists on ecclesiaticism, human power mongering even in the church, human misunderstanding of what truth is and how you find it, the human focus on self rather than on truth.
I came to understand that truth is exclusive. It excludes what I think it should be, what others think I should think it should be, and mostly it excludes my own selfish motives for not wanting it to be what it is. So I have to focus on the reality of truth regardless of the direction it drags me.
If the deity is the source of truth, in the sense of "order" as you say, then it is through order and the ability to reason about order that we see the possibility of real existence of the source of order: the existence of truth and a reality beyond the material.
Once I realized that Materialism is my own construct, I was free to break out and think for myself again.
Again thanks very much for your comment!
Stan
I have been an atheist for about 8 years now. I was a bible believer for about 25 years. I know of no discrimination or abuse directed toward me from believers...but...only a few of the believers that I know are aware of my atheism.
I deal with Christians nearly everyday in my business, and I can't think of one that knows I am an atheist. Reason being - out of fear of financial ruin, I have kept it a secret. Even if I was asked about my religious beliefs by a local Christian, I would probably avoid answering. I am afraid of how my Christian clients would react.
Why do I have to live this way?
Bob,
In the future totally secular society we will all be living this way. It will not be acceptable to reveal personal religious beliefs in any secular situation. In fact, I can see prescreens in the future to weed out religious beliefs from the secular world, starting with Muslims, progressing to other religions, until the completely secular, atheist world is achieved.
During my 40 years of atheism, I had no problem not revealing my atheism. But the militants of today are not so disposed.
The problem Christians have in dealing with atheists is that they cannot know what sort of ethic the individual atheist adheres to. Christians themselves are not angels (by definition), but with atheists there is no telling whether one is a Nietschean or an Ayeran, or a Humean, or what not. And the intransigence of the Humanist Manifestos makes the problem even worse.
So if one just doesn't know the belief background of an individual, then he must go on empirical observation of the behaviors of the individual, not his professed beliefs.
This is not a bad thing, don't you think? I have no problem with a secular society, so long as it does not become Nietzschean.
When I wa very young, religious tolerance was considered a virtue. Now it is not; intolerance of all religions has become the norm. It's a shame. Well, there's no such thing as shame any more. Oh well.
Post a Comment